'We  t*t  forward  from  this  peaceful  neighborhood." 

— "  Vicar  of  Wakefield  " 


A    BOOK   LOVER'S   LIBRARY 
OF   POETICAL   LITERATURE 


IN    TWENTY-FIVE     VOLUMES 


Oliver   Goldsmith 

and 

Thomas    Gray 

With  Introductions 
by  William  Black  and 
Hamilton  W.  Mabie 
and  a  Frontispiece  in 
Color  by  A.  E.  Becher 


THE       CO-OPERATIVE 
P  U  B  I.  I  C  A  T  I  O  M       SOCIETY 

New  York  London 


3  1822  00415  8465 


CONTENTS. 


Life  of  Oliver  Goldsmith 5 

The  Deserted  Village 129 

The  Traveller 151 

The  Hermit 169 

The  Hamich  of  Venison 175 

Retaliation ISO 

Postscript 187 

The  Double  Transformation 188 

The  Gift 191 

An  Elegy  on  the  Death  of  a  Mad  Dog 193 

The  Logicians  Refute  d 194 

A  New  Simile 196 

Description  of  an  Author's  Bed-chamber 198 

A  Prologue 199 

An  Elegy  on  the  Glory  of  Her  Sex 200 

On  a  Beautiful  Youth 201 

The  Clown's  Reply 201 

Epitaph  on  Dr.  Parnell 201 

Epitaph  on  Edward  Purdou 202 

Stanzas  on  the  Taking  of  Quebec 202 

Stanzas  on  Woman 203 

A  Sonnet 203 

Song  from  the  Oratorio  of  the  "  Captivity  " 204 

Song  from  the  Oratorio  of  the  "  Captivity  " 204 

Song  omitted    from  "  She  Stoops  to  Conquer  " 204 

Prologue  to  Zobeide 205 

Epilogue  to  the  Sisters 206 

Epilogue 208 

An  Epilogue . .   211 

22— G  &  G— A 


Sv  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Epilogue 213 

Threnodia  Augustalis 315 

The  Captivity  :  An  Oratorio 225 

Lines 238 

Epilogue 238 

Epilogue 240 

Verses  on  the  Death  of  Dr.  Goldsmith 241 

Extract  from  a  Monody 244 

Lines  by  W.  Wotty 250 

aho  Stoops  to  Conquer "^^dl 


LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 


CHAPTER  L 

IKTRODUCTO  RY. 

"  Innocen'TLY  to  amuse  the  imagination  in  this  dream 
of  life  is  wisdom."  So  wrote  Oliver  Goldsmith;  and  surely 
among  those  who  have  earned  the  world's  gratitude  by  this 
ministration  he  must  be  accorded  a  conspicuous  place.  If, 
in  these  delightful  writings  of  his,  he  mostly  avoids  the 
darker  problems  of  existence — if  the  mystery  of  the  tragic 
and  apparently  unmerited  and  unrequited  suffering  in  the 
world  is  rarely  touched  upon — we  can  pardon  the  omission 
for  the  sake  of  the  gentle  optimism  that  would  rather  look 
on  the  kindly  side  of  life.  '*  You  come  hot  and  tired  from 
the  day's  battle,  and  this  sweet  minstrel  sings  to  you,"  says 
Mr.  Thackeray.  "  Who  could  harm  the  kind  vagrant 
harper?  Whom  did  he  ever  hurt?  He  carries  no  weapon 
save  the  harp  on  which  he  plays  to  you;  and  with  which 
he  delights  great  and  humble,  young  and  old,  the  captains 
in  the  tents,  or  the  soldiers  round  the  fire,  or  the  women 
and  children  in  the  villages,  at  whose  porches  he  stops  and 
flings  his  simple  songs  of  love  and  beauty."  And  it  is  to 
be  suspected — it  is  to  be  hoped,  at  least — that  the  cheerful- 
ness which  shines  like  sunlight  through  Goldsmith's  writ- 
ings, did  not  altogether  desert  himself  even  in  the  most 
trying  hours  of  his  wayward  and  troubled  career.  He  had, 
with  all  his  sensitiveness,  a  fine  happy-go-lucky  disposition; 
was  ready  for  a  frolic  when  he  had  a  guinea,  and,  when  he 
had  none,  could  turn  a  sentence  on  the  humorous  side  of 
starvation;  and  certainly  never  attributed  to  the  injustice 
or  neglect  of  society  misfortunes  the  origin  of  which  lay 
nearer  home. 


6  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Of  course,  a  very  dark  picture  might  be  drawn  of  Gold- 
smith's life;  and  the  sufferings  that  he  undoubtedly  en- 
dured have  been  made  a  whip  with  which  to  lash  the  in- 
gratitude of  a  world  not  too  quick  to  recognize  the  claims 
of  genius.  He  has  been  put  before  us,  without  any 
brigliter  lights  to  the  picture,  as  the  most  unfortunate  of 
poor  devils;  the  heart-broken  usher;  the  hack  ground 
down  by  sordid  book-sellers;  the  starving  occupant  of  suc- 
cessive garrets.  This  is  the  aspect  of  Goldsmith's  career 
which  naturally  attracts  Mr.  Forster.  Mr.  Forster  seems 
to  have  been  haunted  throughout  his  life  by  the  idea  that 
Providence  had  some  especial  spite  against  literary  persons; 
and  that,  in  a  measure  to  compensate  them  for  their  sad 
lot,  society  should  be  very  kind  to  them,  while  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  day  might  make  them  Companions  of  the  Bath 
or  give  them  posts  in  the  Civil  Service.  In  the  otherwise 
copious,  thorough  and  valuable  Life  and  Times  of  Oliver 
Goldsmith,  we  find  an  almost  humiliating  insistance 
on  the  complaint  that  Oliver  Goldsmith  did  not 
receive  greater  recognition  and  larger  sums  of  money 
from  his  contemporaries.  Goldsmith  is  here  "  the 
poor  neglected  sizar;"  his  "marked  ill-fortune"  at- 
tends him  constantly;  he  shares  "the  evil  destinies  of 
men  of  letters;"  he  was  one  of  those  who  "struggled  into 
fame  without  the  aid  of  English  institutions;"  in  short  "  he 
wrote  and  paid  the  penalty."  Nay,  even  Christianity  itself 
is  impeached  on  account  of  the  persecution  suffered  by  poor 
Goldsmith.  "  There  had  been  a  Christian  religion 
extant  for  seventeen  hundred  and  fifty-seven  years,"  writes 
Mr.  Forster,  "  the  world  having  been  acquainted,  for  even 
so  long,  with  its  spiritual  necessities  and  responsibilities; 
yet  here,  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  the 
eminence  ordinarily  conceded  to  a  spiritual  teacher,  to  one 
of  those  men  who  come  upon  the  earth  to  lift  their  fellow- 
men  above  its  miry  ways.  He  is  up  in  a  garret,  writing 
for  bread  he  cannot  get,  and  dunned  for  a  milk- score  he 
cannot  pay."  That  Christianity  might  have  been  worse 
employed  than  in  paying  the  milkman's  score  is  true 
enough,  for  then  the  milkman  would  have  come  by  his 
own;  but  that  Christianity,  or  the  state,  or  society  should 
be  scolded  because  an  author  suffers  the  natural  conse- 
quences of  his  allowing  his  expenditure  to  exceed  his 


INTRODUCTORY.  7 

income,  seems  a  little  hard!  And  this  is  a  sort  of  writing 
that  is  peculiarly  inappropriate  in  the  case  of  Goldsmith, 
who,  if  ever  any  man  was  author  of  his  own  misfortunes, 
may  fairly  have  the  charge  brought  against  him.  "■  Men 
of  genius,"  says  Mr.  Forster,  ''can  more  easily  starve,  than 
the  world,  with  safety  to  itself,  can  continue  to  neglect 
and  starve  them."  Perhaps  so;  but  the  English  nation, 
which  has  always  had  a  regard  and  even  love  for  Oliver 
Goldsmith,  that  is  quite  peculiar  in  the  history  of  literature, 
and  which  has  been  glad  to  overlook  his  faults  and  follies, 
and  eager  to  sympathize  with  him  in  the  many  miseries  of 
his  career,  will  be  slow  to  believe  that  it  is  responsible  for 
any  starvation  that  Goldsmith  may  have  endured. 

However,  the  key-note  has  been  firmly  struck,  and  it 
still  vibrates.  Goldsmith  was  the  unluckiest  of  mortals, 
the  hapless  victim  of  circumstances.  "  Yielding  to  that 
united  pressure  of  labor,  penury  and  sorrow,  with  a  frame 
exhausted  by  unremitting  and  ill-rewarded  drudgery, 
Goldsmith  was  indebted  to  the  forbearance  of  creditors 
for  a  peaceful  burial."  But  what,  now,  if  some  foreigner 
strange  to  the  traditions  of  English  literature — some  Jap- 
anese student,  for  example,  or  the  New  Zealander  come 
before  his  time — were  to  go  over  the  ascertained  facts  of 
Goldsmith's  life,  and  were  suddenly  to  announce  to  us,  with 
the  happy  audacity  of  ignorance,  fhat  he,  Goldsmith,  was  a 
quite  exceptionally  fortunate  person?  "Why,"  he  might 
say,  "  I  find  that  in  a  country  where  the  vast  majority  of 
people  are  born  to  labor,  Oliver  Goldsmith  was  never 
asked  to  do  a  stroke  of  work  toward  the  earning  of  his  own 
living  until  he  had  arrived  at  man's  estate.  All  that  was 
expected  of  him,  as  a  youth  and  as  a  young  man,  was  that 
he  should  equip  himself  fully  for  the  battle  of  life,  lie 
was  maintained  at  college  until  he  had  taken  his  degree. 
Again  and  again  he  was  furnished  with  funds  for  further 
study  and  foreign  travel;  and  again  and  again  he  gambled 
his  opportunities  away.  The  constant  kindness  of  his 
uncle  only  made  him  the  best  begging  letter-writer  the 
world  has  seen.  In  the  midst  of  his  debt  and  distress 
as  a  book-seller's  drudge,  he  receives  £400  for  three  nights' 
performance  of  The  Good  -  Nahired  Man;  he  imme- 
diately purchases  chambers  in  Brick  Court  for  £400; 
and  forthwith  begins  to   borrow  as   before.      It  is   true 


8  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

that  he  died  owing  £2,000,  and  was  indebted  to  the  for- 
bearance of  creditors  for  a  peaceful  burial;  but  it  ap- 
pears that  during  the  last  seven  years  of  his  life  he  had 
been  earning  an  annual  income  equivalent  to  £800  of  Eng- 
lish currency.*  He  was  a  man  liberally  and  affectionately 
brought  up,  who  had  many  relatives  and  many  friends,  and 
who  had  the  proud  satisfaction — which  has  been  denied  to 
many  men  of  genius — of  knowing  for  years  before  he  died 
that  his  merits  as  a  writer  had  been  recognized  by  the  great 
bulk  of  his  countrymen.  And  yet  this  strange  English 
nation  is  inclined  to  suspect  that  it  treated  him  rather 
badly;  and  Christianity  is  attacked  because  it  did  not  pay- 
Goldsmith's  milk-score." 

Our  Japanese  friend  may  be  exaggerating;  but  his  posi- 
tion is,  after  all,  fairly  tenable.  It  may  at  least  be  looked 
at,  before  entering  on  the  following  brief  resume  of  the 
leading  facts  in  Goldsmith's  life,  if  only  to  restore  our 
equanimity.  For,  naturally,  it  is  not  pleasant  to  think 
that  any  previous  generation,  however  neglectful  of  the 
claims  of  literary  persons  (as  compared  with  the  claims  of 
such  wretched  creatures  as  physicians,  men  of  science, 
artists,  engineers,  and  so  forth)  should  so  cruelly  have  ill- 
treated  one  whom  we  all  love  now.  This  inheritance  of 
ingratitude  is  more  than  we  can  bear.  Is  it  true  that 
Goldsmith  was  so  harshly  dealt  with  by  those  barbarian 
ancestors  of  ours? 

*The  calculation  is  Lord  Macauiay's.    See  liis  Biographical 
Essays. 


SCHOOL  AND  COLLEGE.  9 


CHAPTER  II. 

SCHOOL   AND   COLLEGE. 

The  Goldsmiths  were  of  English  descent;  Goldsmith's 
father  was  a  Protestant  clergyman  in  a  poor  little  village 
in  the  county  of  Longford;  and  when  Oliver,  one  of  sev- 
eral children,  was  born  in  this  village  of  Pallas,  or  Pallas- 
more,  on  the  10th  of  November,  1728,  the  Rev.  Charles 
Goldsmith  was  passing  rich  on  £40  a  year.  But  a  couple 
of  years  later  Mr.  Goldsmith  succeeded  to  a  more  lucrative 
living;  and  forthwith  removed  his  family  to  the  village  of 
Lissoy,  in  the  county  of  Westmeath. 

Here  at  once  our  interest  in  the  story  begins;  is  this 
Lissoy  the  sweet  Auburn  that  we  have  known  and  loved 
since  our  childhood?  Lord  Macaulay,  with  a  great  deal  of 
vehemence,  avers  that  it  is  not;  that  there  never  was  any 
such  hamlet  as  Auburn  in  Ireland;  that  The  Deserted  Vil- 
lage is  a  hopelessly  incongruous  poem;  and  that  Goldsmith, 
in  combining  a  description  of  a  probably  Kentish  vil- 
lage with  a  description  of  an  Irish  ejectment,  "has 
produced  something  which  never  was,  and  never  will 
be,  seen  in  any  part  of  the  world."  This  criticism  is 
ingenious  and  plausible,  but  it  is  unsound,  for  it  hap- 
pens to  overlook  one  of  the  radical  facts  of  human  nature 
—the  magnifying  delight  of  the  mind  in  what  is  long 
remembered  and  remote.  What  was  it  that  the  imagina- 
tion of  Goldsmith,  in  his  life-long  banishment,  could  not 
see  when  he  looked  back  to  the  home  of  his  cliildhood, 
and  his  early  friends,  and  the  sports  and  occupations  of 
his  youth?  Lissoy  was  no  doubt  a  poor  enough  Irish  vil- 
lage; and  perhaps  the  farms  were  not  too  well  cultivated; 
and  perhaps  the  village  preacher,  who  was  so  dear  to  all 
the  country  round,  had  to  administer  many  a  thrashing  to 
a  certain  graceless  son  of  his;  and  perhaps  Paddy  Byrne 
was  something  of  a  pedant;  and  no  doubt  pigs  ran  over 


10  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

the  "  nicely  sanded  floor  "of  the  inn;  and  no  doubt  the 
village  statesmen  occasionally  indulged  in  a  free  fight. 
But  do  you  think  that  was  the  Lissoy  that  Goldsmith 
thought  of  in  his  dreary  lodgings  in  Fleet-street  courts? 
No.  It  was  the  Lissoy  where  the  vagrant  lad  had  first 
seen  the  "  primrose  peep  beneath  the  thorn;"  where  he 
had  listened  to  the  mysterious  call  of  the  bittern  by  the  un- 
frequented river;  it  was  a  Lissoy  still  ringing  with  the  glad 
laughter  of  young  people  in  the  twilight  hours;  it  was  a 
Lissoy  forever  beautiful,  and  tender,  and  far  away.  The 
grown  up  Goldsmith  had  not  to  go  to  any  Kentish  village 
for  a  model;  the  familiar  scenes  of  his  youth,  regarded 
with  all  the  wistfulness  and  longing  of  an  exile,  became 
glorified  enough.  "  If  I  go  to  the  opera  where  Signora 
Colomba  pours  out  all  the  mazes  of  melody,"  he  writes  to 
Mro  Hodson,  "  I  sit  and  sigh  for  Lissoy's  fireside,  and 
Johnny  Armstrong's  Last  Good  Night  from  Peggy 
Golden." 

There  was  but  little  in  the  circumstances  of  Goldsmith^s 
early  life  likely  to  fit  him  for,  or  lead  him  into,  a  literary 
career;  in  fact,  he  did  not  take  to  literature  until  he  had 
tried  pretty  nearly  everything  else  as  a  method  of  earning 
a  living.  If  he  was  intended  for  anything,  it  was  no  doubt 
his  father's  wish  that  he  should  enter  the  Church;  and  he 
got  such  education  as  the  poor  Irish  clergymen — who  was 
not  a  very  provident  person — could  afford.  The  child 
Goldsmith  was  first  of  all  taught  his  alphabet  at  home,  by 
a  maid-servant,  who  was  also  a  relation  of  the  family; 
then,  at  the  age  of  six,  he  was  sent  to  that  village  school 
which,  with  its  profound  and  learned  master,  he  has  made 
familiar  to  all  of  us;  and  after  that  he  was  sent  further 
a-field  for  his  learning,  being  moved  from  this  to  the  other 
boarding-school  as  the  occasion  demanded.  Goldsmith's 
school-life  could  not  have  been  altogether  a  pleasant  time 
for  him.  We  hear,  indeed,  of  his  being  concerned  in  a 
good  many  frolics — robbing  orchards,  and  the  like;  and  it 
is  said  that  he  attained  proficiency  in  the  game  of  fives. 
But  a  shy  and  sensitive  lad  like  Goldsmith,  who  was 
eagerly  desirous  of  being  thought  well  of,  and  whose  appear- 
ance only  invited  the  thoughtless  but  cruel  ridicule  of  his 
schoolmates,  must  have  suffered  a  good  deal.  He  was  little, 
pittfed  with  the  small-pox,  and  awkward;  and  school-boys 


SCHOOL  AND  COLLEGE.  H 

are  amazingly  frank.  He  was  not  strong  enough  to  thrash 
them  into  respect  of  him;  he  had  no  big  brother  to  become 
his  champion;  his  pocket-money  was  not  lavish  enough  to 
enable  him  to  buy  over  enemies  or  subsidize  allies. 

In  similar  circumstances  it  has  sometimes  happened  that 
a  boy  physically  inferior  to  his  companions  has  consoled 
himself  by  proving  his  mental  prowess — has  scored  off  his 
failure  at  cricket  by  the  taking  of  prizes,  and  has  revenged 
himself  for  a  drubbing  by  writing  a  lampoon.  But  even 
this  last  resource  was  not  open  to  Goldsmith.  He  was 
a  dull  boy;  "a  stupid,  heavy  blockhead,"  is  Dr. 
Strean's  phrase  in  summing  up  the  estimate  formed 
of  young  Goldsmith  by  his  contemporaries  at  school. 
Of  course,  as  soon  as  he  became  famous,  everybody  began 
to  hunt  up  recollections  of  his  having  said  or  done  this  or 
that,  in  order  to  prove  that  there  were  signs  of  the  coming 
greatness.  People  began  to  remember  that  he  had  been 
suspected  of  scribbling  verses,  which  he  burned.  What 
school-boy  has  not  done  the  like?  We  know  how  the 
biographers  of  great  painters  point  out  to  us  that  their 
hero  early  showed  the  bent  of  his  mind  by  drawing  the 
figures  of  animals  on  doors  and  walls  with  a  piece  of  chalk; 
as  to  which  it  may  be  observed  that,  if  every  school-boy 
who  scribbled  verses  and  sketched  in  chalk  on  a  brick  wall 
were  to  grow  up  a  genius,  poems  and  pictures  would  be 
plentiful  enough.  However,  there  is  the  apparently 
authenticated  anecdote  of  young  Goldsmith's  turning  the 
tables  on  the  fiddler  at  his  uncle's  dancing-party.  The 
fiddler,  struck  by  the  odd  look  of  the  boy  who  was  caper- 
ing about  the  room,  called  out  ''^sop!"  whereupon  Gold- 
smith is  said  to  have  instantly  replied, 

"  Our  herald  hath  proclaimed  this  saying, 
See  /Esop  dancing  and  his  monkey  playing!  " 

But  even  if  this  story  be  true,  it  is  worth  nothing  as  an 
augury;  for  quickness  of  repartee  was  precisely  the  accom- 
plishment which  the  adult  Goldsmith  conspicuously  lacked. 
Put  a  pen  into  his  hand,  and  shut  him  up  in  a  room:  then 
he  was  master  of  the  situation — nothing  could  be  more  in- 
cisive, polished  and  easy  than  his  playful  sarcasm.  But 
in  society  any  fool  could  get  the  better  of  him  by  a  sudden 


12  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

question  followed  by  a  horse-laugh.  All  through  his  life — 
even  after  he  had  become  one  of  the  most  famous  of  living 
writers — Goldsmith  suffered  from  want  of  self-confidence. 
He  was  too  anxious  to  please.  In  his  eager  acquiescence, 
he  would  blunder  into  any  trap  that  was  laid  for  him.  A 
grain  or  two  of  the  stolid  self-sufficiency  of  the  blockheads 
who  laughed  at  him  would  not  only  have  improved  his 
character,  but  would  have  added  considerably  to  the  hap- 
piness of  his  life. 

As  a  natural  consequence  of  this  timidity,  Goldsmith, 
when  opportunity  served,  assumed  airs  of  magnificent  im- 
portance. Every  one  knows  the  story  of  the  mistake  on 
which  She  Stoops  to  Conquer  is  founded.  Getting  free  at 
last  from  all  the  turmoil,  and  anxieties,  and  mortifications 
of  school-life,  and  returning  home  on  a  lent  hack,  the 
released  school-boy  is  feeling  very  grand  indeed.  He  is 
now  sixteen,  would  fain  pass  for  a  man,  and  has  a  whole 
golden  guinea  in  his  pocket.  And  so  he  takes  the  journey 
very  leisurely  until,  getting  benighted  in  a  certain  village, 
he  asks  the  way  to  the  ''best  house, ^^  and  is  directed 
by  a  facetious  person  to  the  house  of  the  squire.  The 
squire  by  good  luck  falls  in  with  the  joke;  and  then 
we  have  a  pretty  comedy  indeed — the  impecunious  school- 
boy playing  the  part  of  a  fine  gentleman  on  the  strength  of 
his  solitary  guinea,  ordering  a  bottle  of  wine  after  his  sup- 
per, and  inviting  his  landlord  and  his  landlord's  wife  and 
daughter  to  join  him  in  the  supper-room.  The  contrast, 
in  She  Stoops  to  Conquer,  between  Marlow's  embarrassed 
diffidence  on  certain  occasions  and  his  audacious  affrontery 
on  others,  found  many  a  parallel  in  the  incidents  of  Gold- 
smith's own  life;  and  it  is  not  improbable  that  the  writer 
of  the  comedy  was  thinking  of  some  of  his  own  experiences, 
when  he  made  Miss  Hardcastle  say  to  her  timid  suitor: 
*'  A  want  of  courage  upon  some  occasions  assumes  the  ap- 
pearance of  ignorance,  and  betrays  us  when  we  most  want 
to  excel." 

It  was,  perhaps,  just  as  well  that  the  supper,  and  bottle 
of  wine,  and  lodging  at  Squire  Featherston's  had  not  to  be 
paid  for  out  of  the  school-boy's  guinea  for  young  Gold- 
smith was  now  on  his  way  to  college,  and  the  funds  at  the 
disposal  of  the  Goldsmith  family  were  not  overabundant. 
Goldsmith's  sister  having  married  the  son  of  a  well-to-do 


SCHOOL  AND  COLLE&E.  13 

man,  her  father  considered  it  a  point  of  honor  that  she 
should  have  a  dowry;  and  in  giving  her  a  sum  of  £400  he 
so  crippled  the  means  of  the  family  that  Goldsmith  had 
to  be  sent  to  college  not  as  a  pensioner  but  as  a  sizar.  It 
appears  that  the  young  gentleman's  pride  revolted  against 
this  proposal;  and  that  he  was  won  over  to  consent  only 
by  the  persuasions  of  his  uncle  Contarine,  who  himself  had 
been  a  sizar.  So  Goldsmith,  now  in  his  eighteenth  year, 
went  to  Dublin;  managed  somehow  or  other — though  he 
was  the  last  in  the  list — to  pass  the  necessary  examination; 
and  entered  upon  his  college  career  (1745). 

How  he  lived,  and  what  he  learned,  at  Trinity  College, 
are  both  largely  matters  of  conjecture;  the  chief  features 
of  such  record  as  we  have  are  the  various  means  of  raising 
a  little  money  to  which  the  poor  sizar  had  to  resort;  a  con- 
tinual quarreling  with  his  tutor,  an  ill-conditioned  brute, 
who  baited  Goldsmith  and  occasionally  beat  him;  and  a 
chance  frolic  when  funds  were  forthcoming.  It  was  while 
he  was  at  Trinity  College  that  his  father  died;  so  that 
Goldsmith  was  rendered  more  than  ever  dependent  on  the 
kindness  of  his  uncle  Contarine,  who  throughout  seems  to 
have  taken  much  interest  in  his  odd,  ungainly  nej)hew,  A 
loan  from  a  friend  or  a  visit  to  the  pawnbroker  tided  over 
the  severer  difficulties;  and  then  from  time  to  time  the 
writing  of  street-ballads,  for  which  he  got  five  shillings  a 
piece  at  a  certain  repository,  came  in  to  help.  It  was  a 
happy-go-lucky,  hand-to-mouth  sort  of  existence,  involving 
a  good  deal  of  hardship  and  humiliation,  but  having  its 
frolics  and  gayeties  notwithstanding.  One  of  these  was 
very  near  to  putting  an  end  to  his  collegiate  career  alto- 
gether. He  had,  smarting  under  a  public  admonition 
for  having  been  concerned  in  a  riot,  taken  seriously  to  his 
studies  and  had  competed  for  a  scholarship.  He  missed 
tl^e  scholarship,  but  gained  an  exhibition  of  the  value  of 
thirty  shillings;  whereupon  he  collected  a  number  of 
friends  of  both  sexes  in  his  rooms,  and  proceeded  to  have 
high  jinks  there.  In  the  midst  of  the  dancing  and  uproar, 
in  comes  his  tutor,  in  such  a  passion  that  he  knocks  Gold- 
smith down.  This  insult,  received  before  his  friends,  was 
too  much  for  the  unlucky  sizar,  who,  the  very  next  day, 
sold  his  books,  ran  away  from  college,  and  ultimately,  after 
having  been  on  the  verge  of  starvation  once  or  twice,  made 


14  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

his  way  to  Lissoy.  Here  his  brother  got  hold  of  him,  per- 
suaded him  to  go  back,  and  the  escapade  was  condoned 
somehow.  Goldsmith  remained  at  Trinity  College  until 
he  took  his  degrees  (1749).  He  was  again  lowest  in  the 
list;  but  still  he  had  passed;  and  he  must  have  learned 
something.  He  was  now  twenty-one,  with  all  the  world 
before  him;  and  the  question  was  as  to  how  he  was  to  em- 
ploy such  knowledge  as  he  had  acquired. 


IDLENESS  AND  FOREIGN  THA  VEL,  15 


CHAPTER  111. 

IDLENESS  AND  FOREIGN  TRAVEL. 

But  Goldsmith  was  not  in  any  hurry  to  acquire  either 
wealth  or  fame.  He  had  a  happy  knack  of  enjoying  the 
present  hour — especially  when  there  were  one  or  two  boon 
companions  with  him,  and  a  pack  of  cards  to  be  found; 
and,  after  his  return  to  his  mother's  house,  he  appears  to 
have  entered  upon  the  business  of  idleness  with  much 
philosophical  satisfaction.  If  he  was  not  quite  such  an 
unlettered  clown  as  he  has  described  in  Tony  Lumpkin,  he 
had  at  least  all  Tony  Lumpkin's  high  spirits  and  love  of 
joking  and  idling;  and  he  was  surrounded  at  the  ale-house 
by  just  such  a  company  of  admirers  as  used  to  meet  at  the 
famous  Three  Pigeons.  Sometimes  he  helped  in  his 
brother's  school;  sometimes  he  went  errands  for  his  mother; 
occasionally  he  would  sit  and  meditatively  play  the  flute — 
for  the  day  was  to  be  passed  somehow;  then  in  the  evening 
came  the  assemblage  in  Conway's  inn,  with  the  glass,  and 
the  pipe,  and  the  cards,  and  the  uproarious  jest  or  song. 
"  But  Scripture  saitli  an  ending  to  all  fine  things  must  be,'* 
and  the  friends  of  this  jovial  young  "  buckeen  "  begun  to 
tire  of  his  idleness  and  his  recurrent  visits.  They  gave 
him  hints  that  he  might  set  about  doing  something  to  pro- 
vide himself  with  a  living;  and  the  first  thing  they  thought 
of  was  that  he  should  go  into  the  Church — perhaps  as  a 
sort  of  purification-house  after  George  Conway's  inn.  Ac- 
cordingly Goldsmith,  who  appears  to  have  been  a  most 
good-natured  and  compliant  youth,  did  make  application 
to  the  Bishop  of  Elphin.  There  is  some  doubt  about  the 
precise  reasons  which  induced  the  Bishop  to  decline  Gold- 
smith's application,  but  at  any  rate  the  Church  was  denied 
the  aid  of  the  young  man's  eloquence  and  erudition.  Then 
he  tried  teaching,  and  through  the  good  offices  of  his  uncle 
he  obtained  a  tutorship  which  he  held  for  a  considerable 


16  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

time — long  enough,  indeed,  to  enable  him  to  amass  a  sum 
of  thirty  pounds.  When  he  quarreled  with  his  patron,  and 
once  more  "took  the  world  for  his  pillow,''  as  the  Gaelic 
stories  say,  he  had  this  sum  in  his  pocket  and  was  possessed 
of  a  good  horse. 

He  started  away  from  Ballymahon,  where  his  mother 
was  now  living,  with  some  vague  notion  of  making  his  fort- 
une as  casual  circumstance  might  direct.  The  expedi- 
tion came  to  a  premature  end;  and  he  returned  without 
the  money,  and  on  the  back  of  a  wretched  animal,  tell- 
ing his  mother  a  cock-and-bull  story  of  the  most  amus- 
ing simplicity.  "  If  Uncle  Contarine  believed  those  let- 
ters," says  Mr.  Thackeray,  " if  Oliver's  mother  be- 
lieved that  story  which  the  youth  related  of  his  going  to 
Cork,  with  the  purpose  of  embarking  for  America;  of 
his  having  paid  his  passage-money,  and  having  sent  his 
kit  on  board;  of  the  anonymous  captain  sailing  away 
with  Oliver's  valuable  luggage,  in  a  nameless  ship, 
never  to  return — if  Uncle  Contarine  and  the  mother  at 
Ballymahon  believed  his  stories,  they  must  have  been  a 
very  simple  pair;  as  it  was  a  very  simple  rogue  indeed 
who  cheated  them."  Indeed,  if  any  one  is  anxious  to 
fill  up  this  hiatus  in  Goldsmith's  life,  the  best  thing  he 
can  do  is  to  discard  Goldsmith's  suspicious  record  of  his 
adventures,  and  put  in  its  place  the  faithful  record  of  the 
adventures  of  Mr.  Barry  Lyndon,  when  that  modest  youth 
left  his  mother's  house  and  rode  to  Dublin,  with  a  certain 
number  of  guineas  in  his  pocket.  But  whether  Uncle 
Contarine  believed  the  story  or  no,  he  was  ready  to  give 
the  young  gentleman  another  chance;  and  this  time  it  was 
the  legal  profession  that  was  chosen.  Goldsmitli  got  fifty 
pounds  from  his  uncle,  and  reached  Dublin.  In  a  remark- 
ably brief  space  of  time  he  had  gambled  away  the  fifty 
pounds,  and  was  on  his  way  back  to  Ballymahon,  where  his 
mother's  reception  of  him  was  not  very  cordial,  though  his 
uncle  forgave  him,  and  was  once  more  ready  to  start  him 
in  life.  But  in  what  direction?  Teaching,  the  Church, 
and  the  law  had  lost  their  attractions  for  him  Well,  this 
time  it  was  medicine.  In  fact,  any  sort  of  project  was 
capable  of  drawing  forth  the  good  old  uncle's  bounty.  The 
funds  were  again  forthcoming;  Goldsmith  started  for 
Edinburgh,  and  now  (1752)  saw  Ireland  for  the  last  time. 


IDLENESS  AND  FOREIGN  TRA  YEL.  17 

He  lived,  and  he  informed  his  uncle  that  he  studied, 
la  Edinburgh  for  a  year  and  a  half;  at  the  end  of  which 
time  it  appeared  to  him  that  his  knowledge  of  medicine 
would  be  much  improved  by  foreign  travel.  There  was 
Albinus,  for  example,  "  the  great  professor  of  Leyden,'* 
as  he  wrote  to  the  credulous  uncle,  from  whom  he  would 
doubtless  learn  much.  When,  having  got  another  twenty 
pounds  for  traveling  expenses,  he  did  reach  Leyden  (1754), 
he  mentioned  Gaubius,  the  cliemical  professor.  Gaubius 
is  also  a  good  name.  That  his  intercourse  with  these 
learned  persons,  and  the  serious  nature  of  his  studies,  were 
not  incompatible  with  a  little  light  relaxation  in  the  way  of 
gambling  is  not  impossible.  On  one  occasion,  it  is  said, 
he  was  so  lucky  that  he  came  to  a  fellow-student  with  his 
pockets  full  of  money,  and  was  induced  to  resolve  never  to 
play  again — a  resolution  broken  as  soon  as  made.  Of  course 
he  lost  all  his  winnings,  and  more;  and  had  to  borrow  a 
trifling  sum  to  get  himself  out  of  the  place.  Then  an  in- 
cident occurs  which  is  highly  characteristic  of  the  better 
side  of  Goldsmith's  nature.  He  had  just  got  this  money, 
and  was  about  to  leave  Leyden,  when,  as  Mr.  Forster 
writes,  "  he  passed  a  florists' garden  on  his  return,  and  see- 
ing some  rare  and  high-priced  flower,  which  his  uncle  Con- 
tarine,  an  enthusiast  in  such  things,  had  often  spoken  and 
been  in  search  of,  he  ran  in  without  other  thought  than  of 
immediate  pleasure  to  his  kindest  friend,  bought  a  parcel 
of  tlie  roots  and  sent  them  ofl'  to  Ireland."  He  had  a  guinea 
in  his  pocket  when  he  started  on  the  grand  tour. 

Of  this  notable  period  in  Goldsmith's  life  (1755-G) 
very  little  is  known,  though  a  good  deal  has  been 
guessed.  A  minute  record  of  all  the  personal  adventures 
that  befell  the  wayfarer  as  he  trudged  from  country  to 
country,  a  diary  of  the  odd  humors  and  fancies  that  must 
have  occurred  to  him  in  liis  solitary  pilgrimages,  would 
be  of  quite  inestimable  value;  but  even  the  letters  that 
Goldsmith  wrote  home  from  time  to  time  are  lost;  while 
The  Traveller  consists  chiefly  of  a  series  of  philosophical 
reflections  on  the  government  of  various  states,  more 
likely  to  have  engaged  the  attention  of  a  Fleet  street 
author,  living  in  an  atmosphere  of  books,  than  to  have 
occupied  the  mind  of  u  tramp  anxious  about  his  supper 
and  his  night's  lodging.      Bos  well  says   he  "disputed'* 


18  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

his  way  through  Europe.  It  is  much  more  probable  that 
he  begged  his  way  through  Europe.  The  romantic  ver- 
sion, which  has  been  made  the  subject  of  many  a  charming 
picture,  is  that  he  was  entertained  by  the  peasantry  whom 
he  had  delighted  with  his  playing  on  the  flute.  It  is  quite 
probable  that  Goldsmith,  whose  imagination  had  been 
captivated  by  the  story  of  how  Baron  von  Holberg  had  as 
a  young  man  really  passed  through  France,  Germany  and 
Holland  in  this  Orpheus-like  manner,  may  have  put  a  flute 
in  his  pocket  when  he  left  Leydeu;  but  it  is  far  from  safe 
to  assume,  as  is  generally  done,  that  Goldsmith  was  himself 
the  hero  of  the  adventures  described  in  Chapter  XXX  of 
the  Vicar  of  Wakefield.  It  is  the  more  to  be  regretted 
that  we  have  no  authentic  record  of  these  devious  wander- 
ings, that  by  this  time  Goldsmith  had  acquired,  as  is  shown 
in  other  letters,  a  polished,  easy  and  graceful  style,  with  a 
very  considerable  faculty  of  humorous  observation.  Those 
ingenious  letters  to  his  uncle  (they  usually  included  a  little 
hint  about  money)  were,  in  fact,  a  trifle  too  literary  both 
in  substance  and  in  form  •  we  could  even  now,  looking  at 
them  with  a  pardonable  curiosity,  have  spared  a  little  of 
their  formal  antithesis  foi  some  more  precise  information 
about  the  writer  and  his  surroundings. 

The  strangest  thing  about  this  strange  journey  all  over 
Europe  was  the  fril  i-e  of  Goldsmith  to  pick  up  even  a 
common  and  ordinary  acquaintance  with  the  familiar  facts 
of  natural  history.  The  ignorance  on  this  point  of  the 
author  of  the  Animated  Nature  was  a  constant  subject  of 
jest  among  Goldsmith's  friends.  They  declared  he  could 
not  tell  the  difference  between  any  two  sorts  of  barn-door 
fowl  until  he  saw  them  cooked  and  on  the  table.  But  it 
may  be  said  prematurely  here  that,  even  when  he  is  wrong 
as  to  his  facts  or  his  sweeping  generalizations,  one  is 
inclined  to  forgive  him  on  account  of  the  quaint  graceful- 
ness and  point  of  his  style.  When  Mr,  Burchell  says, 
"This  rule  seems  to  extend  even  to  other  animals:  the 
little  vermin  race  are  ever  treacherous,  cruel  and  cowardly, 
whilst  those  endowed  with  strength  and  power  are 
generous,  brave  and  gentle,"  we  scarcely  stop  to  reflect 
that  the  merlin,  which  is  not  much  bigger  than  a  thrush, 
has  an  extraordinary  courage  and  spirit,  while  the  lion,  if 
all  stories  be  true,  is,  unless  when  goaded  by  hunger,  an 


IDLENESS  AND  FOREIGN  TRA  VEL.  19 

abject  skulker.  Elsewhere,  indeed,  in  the  Animated 
Nature,  Goldsmith  gives  credit  to  the  smaller  birds  for  a 
good  deal  of  valor,  and  then  goes  on  to  say,  with  a  charm- 
ing freedom.  *'But  their  contentions  are  sometimes  of  a 
gentler  nature.  Two  male  birds  shall  strive  in  song  till, 
after  a  long  struggle,  the  loudest  shall  entirely  silence  the 
other.  During  these  contentions  the  female  sits  an 
attentive  silent  auditor,  and  often  rewards  the  loudest 
songster  with  her  company  during  the  season.^'  Yet  even 
this  description  of  the  battle  of  the  bards,  with  the  queen 
of  love  as  arbiter,  is  scarcely  so  amusing  as  his  happy-go- 
lucky  notions  with  regard  to  the  variability  of  species. 
Tlie  philosopher,  flute  in  hand,  who  went  wandering  from 
the  canals  of  Holland  to  the  ice-ribbed  falls  of  the  Rhine, 
may  have  heard  from  time  to  time  that  contest  between 
fiinging-birds  which  he  so  imaginatively  describes;  but  it 
was  clearly  the  Fleet-street  author,  living  among  books, 
who  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that  intermarriage  of  species 
is  common  among  small  birds  and  rare  among  big  birds. 
Quoting  some  lines  of  Addison's  which  express  the  belief 
that  birds  are  a  virtuous  race — that  the  nightingale,  for 
example,  does  not  covet  the  wife  of  his  neighbor,  the 
blackbird — Goldsmith  goes  on  to  observe,  ''But  whatever 
may  be  the  poet's  opinion,  the  probability  is  against  this 
fidelity  among  the  smaller  tenants  of  the  grove.  The  great 
birds  are  much  more  true  to  their  species  than  these;  and, 
of  consequence,  the  varieties  among  them  are  more  few. 
Of  the  ostrich,  the  cassowary,  and  the  eagle,  there  are  but 
few  species;  and  no  arts  that  man  can  use  could  probably 
induce  them  to  mix  with  each  other." 

What  he  did  bring  back  from  his  foreign  travels  was  a 
medical  degree.  Where  he  got  it,  and  how  he  got  it,  are 
alike  matters  of  pure  conjecture;  but  it  is  extremely  im- 
probable that — whatever  he  might  have  been  willing  to 
write  home  from  Padua  or  Louvain,  in  order  to  coax  an- 
other remittance  from  his  Irish  friends — he  would  after- 
ward, in  the  presence  of  such  men  as  Johnson,  Burke,  and 
Reynolds,  wear  sham  honors.  It  is  much  more  probable 
that,  on  his  finding  those  supplies  from  Ireland  running 
ominously  short,  the  philosopliic  vagabond  determined  to 
prove  to  his  correspondents  that  he  was  really  at  work  some- 
where, instead  of  merely  idling  away  his  time,  begging  or 


20  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

borrowing  the  wherewithal  to  pass  him  from  town  to  town. 
That  he  did  see  something  of  the  foreign  universities  la 
evident  from  his  own  writings;  there  are  touches  of  de- 
scription here  and  there  which  he  could  not  well  have  got 
from  books.  With  this  degree,  and  with  such  book-learn- 
ing and  such  knowledge  of  nature  and  human  nature  as  he 
had  chosen  or  managed  to  pick  up  during  all  those  years, 
he  was  now  called  upon  to  begin  life  for  himself.  The 
Irish  supplies  stopped  altogether.  His  letters  were  left  un- 
answered. And  so  Goldsmith  somehow  or  other  got  back 
to  London  (February  1,  1756),  and  had  to  cast  about  for 
some  way  of  earning  his  daily  bread. 


EABL 7  8TR UQGLES-HACK-  WRITING.  21 


CHAPTER  IV. 

EARLY  STRUGGLES — HACK-WRITIN'O. 

Here  ensued  a  very  dark  period  in  his  life.  He  was 
alone  in  London,  without  friends,  without  money,  without 
introductions;  his  appearance  was  the  reverse  of  prepos- 
sessing; and,  even  despite  that  medical  degree  and  his  ac- 
quaintance with  the  learned  Albinus  and  the  learned 
Gaubius,  he  had  practically  nothing  of  any  value  to  offer 
for  sale  in  the  great  labor-market  of  the  world.  How  he 
managed  to  live  at  all  is  a  mystery:  it  is  certain  that  he 
must  have  endured  a  great  deal  of  want;  and  one  may  well 
sympathize  with  so  gentle  and  sensitive  a  creature  reduced 
to  such  straits,  without  inquiring  too  curiously  into  the 
causes  of  his  misfortunes.  If,  on  the  one  hand,  we  cannot 
accuse  society,  or  Christianity,  or  the  English  government 
of  injustice  and  cruelty  because  Goldsmith  had  gambled 
away  his  chances  and  was  now  called  on  to  pay  the  penalty, 
on  the  other  hand,  we  had  better,  before  blaming  Gold- 
smith himself,  inquire  into  the  origin  of  those  defects  of 
character  which  produced  such  results.  As  this  would 
involve  an  excursus  into  the  controversy  between 
Necessity  and  Free-will,  probably  most  people  would 
rather  leave  it  alone.  It  may  safely  be  said  in  any 
case  that,  while  Goldsmith's  faults  and  follies,  of  which 
he  himself  had  to  suffer  the  consequences,  are  patent 
enough,  his  character,  on  the  whole,  was  distinctly 
a  lovable  one.  Goldsmith  was  his  own  enemy,  and  every- 
body else's  friend;  that  is  not  a  serious  indictment,  as 
things  go.  He  was  quite  well  aware  of  his  weaknesses; 
and  he  was  also — it  may  be  hinted — aware  of  the  good- 
nature which  he  put  forward  as  condonation.  If  some 
foreigner  were  to  ask  how  it  is  tliat  so  thoroughly  a  com- 
mercial people  as  the  English  are — strict  in  the  acknowl- 
edgment and  payment  of  debt — should  have  always  be- 


22  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

trayed  a  sneaking  fondness  for  the  character  of  the  good- 
humored  scapegrace  whose  hand  is  in  everybody's  pocket, 
and  who  throws  away  other  people's  money  with  the  most 
charming  air  in  the  world.  Goldsmith  might  be  pointed 
to  as  one  of  many  literary  teachers  whose  own  circum- 
stances were  not  likely  to  make  them  severe  censors  of  the 
Charles  Surfaces,  or  lenient  judges  of  the  Joseph  Surfaces 
of  the  world.  Be  merry  while  you  may;  let  to-morrow 
take  care  of  itself;  share  your  last  guinea  with  any  one, 
even  if  the  poor  drones  of  society — the  butcher,  and  baker, 
and  milkman  with  his  score — have  to  suffer;  do  anything 
you  like,  so  long  as  you  keep  the  heart  warm.  All  this  is 
a  delightful  philosophy.  It  has  its  moments  of  misery — 
its  periods  of  reaction — but  it  has  its  moments  of  high  de- 
light. When  we  are  invited  to  contemplate  the  "evil  des- 
tinies of  men  of  letters,"  we  ought  to  be  shown  the  flood- 
tides  as  well  as  the  ebb-tides.  The  tavern  gayety;  the 
brand-new  coat  and  lace  and  sword;  the  midnight  frolics, 
with  Jolly  companions  every  one — these,  however  brief  and 
intermittent,  should  not  be  wholly  left  out  of  the  picture. 
Of  course  it  is  very  dreadful  to  hear  of  poor  Boyse  lying  in 
bed  with  nothing  but  a  blanket  over  him,  and  with  hia 
arms  thrust  through  two  holes  in  the  blanket,  so  that  he 
could  write — perhaps  a  continuation  of  his  poem  on  the 
Deity.  But  then  we  should  be  shown  Boyse  when  he  was 
spending  the  money  collected  by  Dr.  Johnson  to  get  the 
poor  scribbler's  clothes  out  of  pawn;  and  we  should  also  be 
shown  him,  with  his  hands  through  the  holes  in  the  blanket, 
enjoying  the  mushrooms  and  truffles  on  which,  as  a  little 
garniture  for  "  his  last  scrap  of  beef,"  he  had  just  laid  out 
his  last  half-guinea. 

There  were  but  few  truffles — probably  there  was  but 
little  beef — for  Goldsmith  during  this  somber  period. 
"  His  threadbare  coat,  his  uncouth  figure  and  Hibernian 
dialect  caused  him  to  meet  with  repeated  refusals."  But 
at  length  he  got  some  employment  in  a  chemist's  shop,  and 
this  was  a  start.  Then  he  tried  practising  in  a  small  way 
on  his  own  account  in  Southwark.  Here  he  made  the 
acquaintance  of  a  printer's  workman;  and  through  him  he 
was  engaged  as  corrector  of  the  press  in  the  establishment 
of  Mr.  Samuel  Richardson.  Being  so  near  to  literature, 
he   caught  the   infection;    and    naturally    began  with  a 


EABL T  8TR UGGLES-EACK-  WRITING.  23 

tragedy.  This  tragedy  was  shown  to  the  author  of  Clarissa 
Harlowe;  but  it  only  went  the  way  of  many  similar  first  in- 
spiritings  of  the  Muse.  Then  G-oldsmith  drifted  to  Peck- 
ham,  where  we  find  him  (1757)  installed  as  usher  at  Dr. 
Milner's  school.  Goldsmith  as  usher  had  been  the  object 
of  much  sympathy;  and  he  would  certainly  deserve  it,  if  we 
are  to  assume  that  his  description  of  an  usher's  position  in 
the  Bee,  and  in  George  Primrose's  advice  to  his  cousin,  was 
a  full  and  accurate  description  of  his  life  at  Peckham. 
*'  Brow-beat  by  the  master,  hated  for  my  ugly  face  by  the 
mistress,  worried  by  the  boys  " — if  that  was  his  life,  he  was 
much  to  be  pitied.  But  we  cannot  believe  it.  The  M li- 
ners were  exceedingly  kind  to  Goldsmith.  It  was  at  the 
intercession  of  young  Milner,  who  had  been  his  fellow- 
student  at  Edinburgh,  that  Goldsmith  got  the  situation, 
which  at  all  event-  kept  him  out  of  reach  of  immediate 
want.  It  was  through  the  Milners  that  he  was  introduced 
to  Grifiiths,  who  gave  him  a  chance  of  trying  a  literary 
career — as  a  hack-writer  of  reviews  and  so  forth.  When, 
having  got  tired  of  that.  Goldsmith  was  again  floating 
vaguely  on  the  waves  of  chance,  where  did  he  find  a  harbor 
but  in  that  very  school  at  Peckham?  And  we  have  the 
direct  testimony  of  the  youngest  of  Dr.  Milner's  daughters, 
that  this  Irish  usher  of  theirs  was  a  remarkably  cheerful, 
and  even  facetious  person,  constantly  playing  tricks  and 
practical  jokes,  amusing  the  boys  by  telling  stories  and  by 
performances  on  the  flute,  living  a  careless  life,  and  always 
in  advance  of  his  salary.  Any  beggar,  or  group  of  chil- 
dren, even  the  very  boys  who  played  back  practical  jokes 
on  him,  were  welcome  to  a  share  of  what  small  funds  he 
had;  and  we  all  know  how  Mrs.  Milner  good-naturedly 
said  one  day,  ''  You  had  better,  Mr.  Goldsmith,  let  me 
keep  your  money  for  you,  as  I  do  for  some  of  the  young 
gentlemen;"  and  how  he  answered  with  much  simplicity, 
"In  truth,  madam,  there  is  equal  need."  With  Gold- 
smith's love  of  approbation  and  extreme  sensitiveness,  he 
no  doubt  suffered  deeply  from  many  slights,  now  as  at 
other  times;  but  what  we  know  of  his  life  in  the  Peckham 
school  does  not  incline  us  to  believe  that  it  was  an  especi- 
ally miserable  period  of  his  existence.  His  abundant 
clieerfulncss  does  not  seem  at  any  time  to  have  deserted 
him;  and  what  with  tricks,  and  jokes,  and  playing  of  the 


24  LIFE  OF  00LD8MITE. 

flute,  the  dull  routine  of  instructing  the  unruly  young 
gentlemen  at  Dr.  Milner's  was  got  through  somehow. 

When  Goldsmith  left  the  Peckham  school  to  try  hack- 
writing  in  Paternoster  Eow,  he  was  going  further  to  fare 
worse.  Griffiths  the  book-seller,  when  he  met  Goldsmith 
at  Dr.  Milner's  dinner-table  and  invited  him  to  become  a 
reviewer,  was  doing  a  service  to  the  English  nation — for  it 
was  in  this  period  of  machine-work  that  Goldsmith  dis- 
covered that  happy  faculty  of  literary  expression  that  led 
to  the  composition  of  his  masterpieces — but  he  was  doing 
little  immediate  service  to  Goldsmith. 

The  newly  captured  hack  was  boarded  and  lodged  at 
Griffiths'  house  in  Paternoster  Row  (1757);  he  was  to  have 
a  small  salary  in  consideration  of  remorselessly  constant 
work;  and — what  was  the  hardest  condition  of  all — he  was 
to  have  his  writings  revised  by  Mrs.  Griffiths.  Mr.  Fors- 
ter  justly  remarks  that  though  at  las^  Goldsmith  had  thus 
become  a  man-of- letters,  he  ''  had  gratified  no  passion  and 
attained  no  object  of  ambition."  He  had  taken  to  litera- 
ture, as  so  many  others  have  done,  merely  as  a  last  re- 
source. And  if  it  is  true  that  literature  at  first  treated 
Goldsmith  harshly,  made  him  work  hard,  and  gave  him 
comparatively  little  for  what  he  did,  at  least  it  must  be 
said  that  his  experience  was  not  a  singular  one.  Mr.  Fors- 
ter  says  that  literature  was  at  that  time  in  a  transition 
state:  "The  patron  was  gone,  and  the  public  had  not 
come."  But  when  Goldsmith  begun  to  do  better  than 
hack-work,  he  found  a  public  speedily  enough.  If,  as 
Lord  Macaulay  computes,  Goldsmith  received  in  the  last 
seven  years  of  his  life  what  was  equivalent  to  £5,600  of  our 
money,  even  the  villain  book-sellers  cannot  be  accused  of 
having  starved  him.  At  the  outset  of  his  literary  career  he 
received  no  large  sums,  for  he  had  achieved  no  reputation; 
but  he  got  the  market-rate  for  his  work.  We  have  around 
us  at  this  moment  plenty  of  hacks  who  do  not  earn  much 
more  than  their  board  and  lodging  with  a  small  salary. 

For  the  rest,  we  have  no  means  of  knowing  whether 
Goldsmith  got  through  his  work  with  ease  or  with  diffi- 
culty; but  it  is  obvious,  looking  over  the  reviews  which  he 
is  believed  to  have  written  for  Griffiths'  magazine,  that  he 
readily  acquired  the  professional  critic's  airs  of  superiority, 
along  with  a  few  tricks  of  the  trade,  no  doubt  taught  him 


EARL  Y  8TR UQGLE&-HACK-  WRITING.  25 

by  Griffiths.  Several  of  these  reviews,  for  example,  are 
merely  epitomes  of  the  contents  of  the  books  reviewed, 
with  some  vague  suggestion  that  the  writer  might,  if  he 
had  been  less  careful,  have  done  worse,  and,  if  he  had 
been  more  careful,  might  have  done  better.  Who  does 
not  remember,  how  the  philosophic  vagabond  was  taught 
to  become  a  cognoscente?  "  The  whole  secret  consisted  in 
a  strict  adherence  to  two  rules:  the  one  always  to  observe 
that  the  picture  might  have  been  better  if  the  painter  had 
taken  more  pains;  and  the  other  to  praise  the  works  of 
Pietro  Perugino.'^  It  is  amusing  to  observe  the  different 
estimates  formed  of  the  function  of  criticism  by  Goldsmith 
the  critic  and  by  Goldsmith  the  author.  Goldsmith,  sit- 
ting at  Griffith's  desk,  naturally  magnifies  his  office,  and 
announces  his  opinion  that  "  to  direct  our  taste,  and  con- 
duct the  poet  up  to  perfection,  has  ever  been  the  critic's 
province."  But  Goldsmith  the  author,  when  he  comes  to 
inquire  into  the  existing  state  of  Polite  Learning  in 
Europe,  finds  in  criticism  not  a  help  but  a  danger.  It  is 
"  the  natural  destroyer  of  polite  learning."  And  again,  in 
the  Citizen  of  the  World,  he  exclaims  against  the  preten- 
sions of  the  critic.  "  If  any  choose  to  be  critics,  it  is  but 
saving  they  are  critics;  and  from  that  time  forward  tliey 
become  invested  with  full  power  and  authority  over  every 
caitiff  who  aims  at  their  instruction  or  entertainment." 

This  at  least  may  be  said,  that  in  these  early  essays  con- 
tributed to  the  Monthly  Revieiv  there  is  much  more  ot 
Goldsmith  the  critic  than  of  Goldsmith  the  author.  They 
are  somewhat  labored  performances.  They  are  always  de- 
void of  the  sly  and  delicate  humor  that  afterward  marked 
Goldsmith's  best  prose  work.  We  find  througkout  his 
trick  of  antithesis;  but  here  it  is  forced  and  formal,  whereas 
afterward  he  lent  to  this  habit  of  writing  the  subtle  sur- 
prise of  epigram.  They  have  the  true  manner  of  authority, 
nevertheless.  He  says  of  Home's  Douglas:  "  Those  parts 
of  nature,  and  that  rural  simplicity  with  which  the  author 
was,  perhaps,  best  acquainted,  are  not  unhappily  described, 
and  hence  we  are  led  to  conjecture  tliat  a  more  universal 
knowledge  of  nature  will  probably  increase  his  powers  of 
description."  If  the  author  had  written  otherwise,  he 
would  have  written  differently;  had  he  known  more,  he 
would  not  have  been  so  ignorant:  the  tragedy  is  a  tragedy. 


36  LIFE  OF  OOLDSMITB. 

but  why  did  not  the  author  make  it  a  comedy, — ^this  sort 
of  criticism  has  been  heard  of  even  in  our  own  day.  How- 
ever, Goldsmith  pounded  away  at  his  newly-found  work, 
under  the  eye  of  the  exacting  book-seller  and  his  learned 
wife.  We  find  him  dealing  with  Scandinavian  (here  called 
Celtic)  mythology,  though  he  does  not  adventure  on  much 
comment  of  his  own;  then  he  engages  Smollett's  History 
of  England,  but  mostly  in  the  way  of  extract;  anon  we 
find  him  reviewing  A  Journal  of  Eight  Days'  Journey,  by 
Jonas  Hanway,  of  whom  Johnson  said  that  he  made  some 
reputation  by  traveling  abroad,  and  lost  it  all  by  traveling 
at  home.  Then  again  we  find  him  writing  a  disquisition 
on  Some  Enquiries  concerning  the  First  Inhabitants,  Lan- 
guage, Religion,  Learning,  and  Letters  of  Europe,  by  a 
Mr.  Wise,  who,  along  with  his  critic,  appears  to  have  got 
into  hopeless  confusion  in  believing  Basque  and  Armorican 
to  be  the  remains  of  the  same  ancient  language.  The  last 
phrase  of  a  note  appended  to  this  review  by  Goldsmith 
probably  indicates  his  own  humble  estimate  of  his  work  at 
this  time.  *'  It  is  more  our  business,"  he  says,  "  to  exhibit 
the  opinions  of  the  learned  than  to  controvert  them."  In 
fact,  he  was  employed  to  boil  down  books  for  people  who 
did  not  wish  to  spend  more  on  literature  than  the  price  of  a 
magazine.  Though  he  was  new  to  the  trade,  it  is  prob- 
able he  did  it  as  well  as  any  other. 

At  the  end  of  five  months.  Goldsmith  and  Griffiths  quar- 
reled and  separated,  Griffiths  said  Goldsmith  was  idle; 
Goldsmith  said  Griffiths  was  impertinent:  probably  the 
editorial  supervision  exercised  by  Mrs.  Griffiths  had  some- 
thing to  do  with  the  dire  contention.  From  Paternoster 
Eow  Goldsmith  removed  to  a  garret  in  Fleet  Street;  had 
his  letters  addressed  to  a  cofEee-house;  and  apparently  sup- 
ported himself  by  further  hack-work,  his  connection  with 
Griffiths  not  being  quite  severed.  Then  he  drifted  back  to 
Peckham  again;  and  was  once  more  installed  as  usher,  Dr. 
Milner  being  in  especial  want  of  an  assistant  at  this  time. 
Goldsmith's  lingering  about  the  gates  of  literature  had  not 
inspired  him  with  any  great  ambition  to  enter  the  enchanted 
land.  But  at  the  same  time  he  thought  he  saw  in  litera- 
ture a  means  by  which  a  little  ready  money  might  be  made, 
in  order  to  help  him  on  to  something  more  definite  and  sub- 
stantial; and  this  goal  was  now  put  before  him  by  Dr.  Mil- 


EARL  Y  STB  UGGLES-HACK-  WRITING.  27 

ner,  in  the  shape  of  a  medical  appointment  on  the  Coro- 
mandel  coast.  It  was  in  the  hope  of  obtaining  this 
appointment  that  he  set  about  composing  that  Enquiry 
into  the  Present  State  of  Polite  Learning  in  Europe,  which 
is  now  interesting  to  us  as  the  first  of  his  more  ambitious 
works.  As  the  book  grew  under  his  hands,  he  begun  to 
cast  about  for  subscribers;  and  from  the  Fleet-street  coffee- 
house— he  had  again  left  the  Peckham  school — he  addressed 
to  his  friends  and  relatives  a  series  of  letters  of  the  most 
charming  humor,  which  might  have  drawn  subscriptions 
from  a  millstone.  To  his  brother-in-law,  Mr.  Hodson,  he 
sent  a  glowing  account  of  the  great  fortune  in  store  for 
him  on  the  Coromandel  coast.  "  The  salary  is  but  tri- 
fling," he  writes,  "namely  £100  per  annum,  but  the  other 
advantages,  if  a  person  be  prudent,  are  considerable.  The 
practice  of  the  place,  if  I  am  rightly  informed,  generally 
amounts  to  not  less  than  £1,000  per  annum,  for  which  the 
appointed  physician  has  an  exclusive  privilege.  This,  with 
the  advantages  resulting  from  trade,  and  the  high  interest 
which  money  bears,  viz.,  twenty  per  cent.,  are  tlie  induce- 
ments which  persuade  me  to  undergo  the  fatigues  of  sea, 
the  dangers  of  war,  and  the  still  greater  dangers  of  the 
climate;  which  induce  me  to  leave  a  place  where  I  am 
every  day  gaining  friends  and  esteem,  and  where  I  might 
enjoy  all  the  conveniences  of  life." 

The  surprising  part  of  this  episode  in  Goldsmith's  life  is 
that  he  did  really  receive  the  appointment;  in  fact,  he  was 
called  upon  to  pay  £10  for  the  appointment-warrant.  In 
this  emergency  he  went  to  the  proprietor  of  the  Critical 
Revieiu,  the  rival  of  the  Monthly,  and  obtained  some  money 
for  certain  anonymous  work  which  need  not  be  mentioned 
in  detail  here.  He  also  moved  into  another  garret,  this 
time  in  Green-Arbor  Court,  Fleet  Street,  in  a  wilderness  of 
Blums.  The  Coromandel  project,  however,  on  which  so 
many  hopes  had  been  built,  fell  through.  No  explanation 
of  the  collapse  could  be  got  from  either  Goldsmith  himself 
or  from  Dr.  Milner.  Mr.  Forster  suggests  that  Gold- 
smith's inability  to  raise  money  for  his  outfit  may  have 
been  made  the  excuse  for  transferring  the  appointment  to 
another;  and  that  is  probable  enough;  but  it  is  also  prob- 
able that  the  need  for  such  an  excuse  was  based  on  the 
discovery  that  Goldsmith  was  not  properly  qualified  for  the 

22— G  &  G— B 


28  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

post.  And  this  seems  the  more  likely,  that  Goldsmith  im- 
mediately afterward  resolved  to  challenge  examination  at 
Surgeons'"  Hall.  He  undertook  to  write  four  articles  for 
the  Mo)ithIy  Review;  Griffiths  became  surety  to  a  tailor  for 
a  fine  suit  of  clothes;  and  thus  equipped,  Goldsmith  pre- 
sented himself  at  Surgeons'  Hall.  He  only  wanted  to  be 
passed  as  hospital  mate;  but  even  that  modest  ambition 
was  unfulfilled.  He  was  found  not  qualified,  and  returned, 
with  his  fine  clothes,  to  his  Fleet-street  den.  He  was  now 
thirty  years  of  age  (1758);  and  had  found  lio  definite 
occupation  in  the  world. 


JSEQINNINQ  OF  A  UlEOUSHJF—THE  BEE,         39 


CHAPTER  V. 

BEGIIS'KTNG   OF  AUTHORSHIP — THE   BEE. 

DuRi^N^G  the  period  that  now  ensued,  and  amid  much 
quarreling  with  Griffiths  and  hack-writing  for  the  Criti- 
cal Revieio,  Goldsmith-  managed  to  get  his  Enquiry  into 
the  Present  State  of  Polite  Learning  in  Europe  com- 
pleted, and  it  is  from  the  publication  of  that  work,  on  the 
2d  of  April,  1759,  that  we  may  date  the  beginning  of 
Goldsmith's  career  as  an  author.  The  book  was  published 
anonymously;  but  Goldsmith  was  not  at  all  anxious  to  dis- 
claim the  parentage  of  his  first-born;  and  in  Grub  Street 
and  its  environs,  at  least,  the  authorship  of  the  book  was 
no  secret.  Moreover,  there  was  that  in  it  which  was 
likely  to  provoke  the  literary  tribe  to  plenty  of  fierce  talk- 
ing. The  Enquiry  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  an  en- 
deavor to  prove  that  criticism  has  in  all  ages  been  the 
deadly  enemy  of  art  and  literature;  coupled  with  an  appeal 
to  authors  to  draw  their  inspiration  from  nature  rather 
than  from  books,  and  varied  here  and  there  by  a  gentle  sigh 
over  the  loss  of  that  patronage,  in  the  sunshine  of  which 
men  of  genius  were  wont  to  bask.  Goldsmith,  not  having 
been  an  author  himself,  could  not  have  sufl'ered  much  at 
the  hands  of  the  critics;  so  that  it  is  not  to  be  supposed 
that  personal  feeling  dictated  this  fierce  onslaught  on  the 
whole  tribe  of  critics,  compilers  and  commentators. 
They  are  represented  to  us  as  rank  weeds  growing  up  to 
choke  all  manifestations  of  true  art.  *'  Ancient  Learn- 
ing," we  are  told  at  the  outset,  "■  may  be  distinguished  into 
three  periods:  its  commencement,  or  the  age  of  poets;  its 
maturity,  or  the  age  of  philosophers;  and  its  decline,  or 
the  age  of  critics."  Then  our  guide  carries  us  into  the 
dark  ages;  and,  with  lantern  in  hand,  shows  us  the  crea- 
tures swarming  there  in  the  sluggish  pools — '*  commenta- 
tors, compilers,  polemic  divines  and  intricate  metaphysi- 


30  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

cians."  We  come  to  Italy:  look  at  the  affectations  with 
which  the  Virtuosi  and  Filosofi  have  enchained  the  free 
spirit  of  poetry.  "  Poetry  is  no  longer  among  them  au 
imitation  of  what  we  see,  but  of  what  a  visionary  might 
wish.  The  zephyr  breathes  the  most  exquisite  perfume; 
the  trees  wear  eternal  verdure;  fawns,  and  dryads,  and  ham- 
adryads, stand  ready  to  fan  the  sultry  shepherdess,  who  has 
forgot,  indeed,  the  prettiness  with  which  Guarini's  shep- 
herdess have  been  reproached,  but  is  so  simple  and  inno- 
cent as  often  to  have  no  meaning.  Happy  country,  where 
the  pastoral  age  begins  to  revive! — where  the  wits  even  of 
Rome  are  united  into  a  rural  group  of  nymphs  and  swains, 
under  the  appellation  of  modern  Arcadians ! — where  in  the 
midst  of  porticoes,  processions,  and  cavalcades,  abbes 
turned  shepherds  and  shepherdesses  without  sheep  indulge 
their  innocent  divertimenti !  " 

In  Germany  the  ponderous  volumes  of  the  commentators 
next  come  in  for  animadversion;  and  here  we  find  an  epi- 
gram, the  quaint  simplicity  of  which  is  peculiarly  charac- 
teristic of  Goldsmith.  "Were  angels  to  write  books,"  he 
remarks,  "they  never  would  write  folios."  But  Germany 
gets  credit  for  the  money  spent  by  her  potentates  on  learned 
institutions;  and  it  is  perhaps  England  that  is  delicately 
hinted  at  in  these  words:  "  Had  the  fourth  part  of  the  im- 
mense su  m  above  mentioned  been  given  in  proper  rewards  to 
genius,  in  some  neighbororing  countries,  it  would  have 
rendered  the  name  of  the  donor  immortal,  and  added  to 
the  real  interests  of  society."  Indeed,  when  we  come  to 
England,  we  find  that  men  of  letters  are  in  a  bad  way, 
owing  to  the  prevalence  of  critics,  the  tyranny  of  book- 
sellers, and  the  absence  of  patrons.  "  The  author,  when 
unpatronized  by  the  great,  has  naturally  recourse  to  the 
book-seller.  There  cannot  perhaps  be  imagined  a  com- 
bination more  prejudicial  to  taste  than  this.  It  is  the  in- 
terest of  the  one  to  allow  as  little  for  writing,  and  of  the 
other  to  write  as  much  as  possible.  Accordingly,  tedious 
compilations  and  periodical  magazines  are  the  result  of 
their  joint  endeavors.  In  these  circumstances  the  author 
bids  adieu  to  fame,  writes  for  bread,  and  for  that  only. 
Imagination  is  seldom  called  in.  He  sits  down  to  address 
the  venal  muse  with  the  most  phlegmatic  apathy;  and,  as 
we  are  told  of  the  Russian,  courts  his  mistress  by  falling 


BEOINNINQ  OF  A  TJTHORSHIP—THB  BEE.  31 

asleep  in  her  lap.  His  reputation  never  spreads  in  a  wider 
circle  than  that  of  the  trade,  who  generally  value  him,  not 
for  the  fineness  of  his  compositions,  but  the  quantity  he 
works  off  in  a  given  time. 

'^  A  long  habit  of  writing  for  bread  thus  turns  the  am- 
bition of  every  author  at  last  into  avarice.  He  finds  that 
he  has  written  many  years,  that  the  public  are  scarcely 
acquainted  even  with  his  name;  he  despairs  of  applause, 
and  turns  to  profit,  which  invites  him.  He  finds  that 
money  procures  all  those  advantages,  that  respect,  and 
that  ease  which  he  vainly  expected  from  fame.  Thus  the 
man,  who,  under  the  protection  of  the  great,  might  have 
done  honor  to  humanity,  when  only  patronized  by  the 
book-seller  becomes  a  thing  little  superior  to  the  fellow 
who  works  at  the  press. 

Nor  was  he  afraid  to  attack  the  critics  of  his  own  day, 
though  he  knew  that  the  two  Eeviews  for  which  he  had 
recently  been  writing  would  have  something  to  say  about 
his  own  Enquiry.  This  is  how  he  disposes  of  the  Critical 
and  the  Montlily:  *'  We  have  two  literary  Eeviews  in  Lon- 
don, with  critical  newspapers  and  magazines  without  num- 
ber. The  compilers  of  these  resemble  the  commoners  of 
Rome;  they  are  all  for  levelling  property,  not  by  increasing 
their  own,  but  by  diminishing  that  of  others.  The  man 
who  has  any  good-nature  in  his  disposition  must,  however, 
be  somewhat  displeased  to  see  distinguished  reputations 
often  tlie  sport  of  ignorance — to  see,  by  one  false  pleasantry, 
the  future  peace  of  a  worthy  man's  life  disturbed,  and  this 
only  because  he  has  unsuccessfully  attempted  to  instruct  or 
amuse  us.  Though  ill- nature  is  far  from  being  wit,  yet  it 
is  generally  laughed  at  as  such.  The  critic  enjoys  the  tri- 
umph, and  ascribes  to  his  parts  what  is  only  due  to  his 
effrontery.  I  fire  with  indignation  when  I  see  persons 
wholly  destitute  of  education  and  genius  indent  to  the 
press,and  thus  turn  book-makers,  adding  to  the  sin  of  crit- 
icism the  sin  of  ignorance  also;  whose  trade  is  a  bad  one, 
and  who  are  bad  workmen  in  the  trade."  Indeed  there 
was  a  good  deal  of  random  hitting  in  the  Enquiry,  which 
was  suio  to  provoke  resentment.  Why,  for  example,  should 
he  have  gone  out  of  his  way  to  insult  the  highly  respectable 
class  of  people  who  excel  in  mathematical  studies?  "  This 
seems  a  science,"  he  observes,  *'  to  which  the  meanest  intel- 


32  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

lects  are  equal.  I  forget  who  it  is  that  says,  'All  men 
might  understand  mathematics  if  they  would. '^^  There 
was  also  in  the  first  edition  of  the  E^iquiry  a  somewhat 
ungenerous  attack  on  stage-managers,  actors,  actresses,  and 
theatrical  things  in  general;  but  this  was  afterward  wisely 
excised.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that,  on  the  whole, 
the  E7iquiry  should  have  been  severely  handled  in  certain 
quarters.  Smollett,  who  reviewed  it  in  the  Critical  Review, 
appears  to  have  kept  his  temper  pretty  well  for  a  Scotch- 
man; but  Kenrick,  a  hack  employed  by  Griffiths  to  mal- 
treat the  book  in  the  Monthly  Eeview,  flourished  his 
bludgeon  in  a  brave  manner.  The  coarse  personalities  and 
malevolent  insinuations  of  this  bully  no  doubt  hurt  Gold- 
smith considerably;  but,  as  we  look  at  them  now,  they  are 
only  remarkable  for  their  dullness.  If  Griffiths  had  had 
another  Goldsmith  to  reply  to  Goldsmith,  the  retort  would 
have  been  better  worth  reading:  one  can  imagine  the  play- 
ful sarcasm  that  would  have  been  dealt  out  to  this  new 
writer,  who,  in  the  very  act  of  protesting  against  criticism, 
proclaimed  himself  a  critic.  But  Goldsmiths  are  not 
always  to  be  had  when  wanted;  while  Kenricks  can  be 
bought  at  any  moment  for  a  guinea  or  two  a  head. 

Goldsmith  had  not  chosen  literature  as  the  occupation 
of  his  life;  he  had  only  fallen  back  on  it  when  other  proj- 
ects failed.  But  it  is  quite  possible  that  now,  as  he  began 
to  take  up  some  slight  position  as  an  author,  the  old  ambi- 
tion of  distinguishing  himself — which  had  flickered  before 
his  imagination  from  time  to  time — began  to  enter  into 
his  calculations  along  with  the  more  pressing  business  of 
earning  a  livelihood.  And  he  was  soon  to  have  an  oppor- 
tunity of  appealing  to  a  wider  public  than  could  have 
been  expected  for  that  erudite  treatise  on  the  arts  of 
Europe.  Mr.  Wilkie,  a  book-seller  in  St.  Paul's  Church- 
yard, proposed  to  start  a  weekly  magazine,  price 
threepence,  to  contain  essays,  short  stories,  letters  on  the 
topics  of  the  day,  and  so  forth,  more  or  less  after  the 
manner  of  the  Spectator.  He  asked  Goldsmith  to  become 
sole  contributor.  Here,  indeed,  was  a  very  good  opening; 
for,  although  there  were  many  magazines  in  the  field,  the 
public  had  just  then  a  fancy  for  literature  in  small  doses; 
while  Goldsmith,  in  entering  into  the  competition,  would 
not  be  hampered   by  the  dullness  of  collaborateurs.     He 


BEGINNING  OF  AUTHORSHIP— TEE  BEE.  33 

closed  with  Wilkie's  offer;  and  on  the  6th  of  October,  1759, 
appeared  the  first  number  of  the  Bee. 

For  us  now  there  is  a  curious  autobiographical  interest 
in  the  opening  sentences  of  the  first  number;  but  surely 
even  the  public  of  the  day  must  have  imagined  that  the 
new'writer  who  was  now  addressing  them  was  not  to  be 
confounded  with  the  common  herd  of  magazine-hacks. 
What  could  be  more  delightful  than  this  odd  mixture  of 
modesty,  humor  and  an  anxious  desire  to  please? — 
"  There  is  not,  perhaps,  a  more  whimsically  dismal  figure 
in  nature  than  a  man  of  real  modesty,  who  assumes  an  air 
of  impudence — who,  while  his  heart  beats  with  anxiety, 
studies  ease  and  affects  good-iiumor.  In  this  situation, 
however,  a  periodical  writer  often  finds  himself  upon  his 
first  attempt  to  address  the  public  in  form.  AH  his 
power  of  pleasing  is  damped  by  solicitude,  and  his  cheer- 
fulness dashed  with  apprehension.  Impressed  with  the 
terrors  of  the  tribunal  before  which  he  is  gomg  to  appear, 
his  natural  humor  turns  to  pertness,  and  for  real  wit  he  is 
obliged  to  substitute  vivacity.  His  first  publication  draws 
a  crowd;  they  part  dissatisfied;  and  the  author,  never 
more  to  be  indulged  with  a  favorable  hearing,  is  left  to 
condemn  the  indelicacy  of  his  own  address  or  their  want 
of  discernment.  For  my  part,  as  I  was  never  distinguished 
for  address,  and  have  often  even  blundered  in  making  my 
bow,  such  bodings  as  these  had  like  to  have  totally  re- 
pressed my  ambition.  I  was  at  a  loss  whether  to  give  the 
public  specious  promises,  or  give  none;  whether  to  be 
merry  or  sad  on  this  solemn  occasion.  If  I  should  decline 
all  merit,  it  was  too  probable  the  hasty  reader  might  have 
taken  me  at  my  word.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  like  laborers 
in  the  magazine  trade,  I  had,  with  modest  impudence, 
humbly  presumed  to  promise  an  epitome  of  all  the  good 
things  that  ever  were  said  or  written,  this  might  have  dis- 
gusted those  readers  I  most  desire  to  please.  Had  I  been 
merry,  I  might  have  been  censured  as  vastly  low;  and  had 
I  been  sorrowful,  I  might  have  been  left  to  mourn  in  soli- 
tude and  silence;  in  short,  whichever  way  I  turned,  noth- 
ing presented  but  prospects  of  terror,  despair,  chandlers' 
Bhops  and  waste  paper." 

And  it  is  just  possible  that  if  Goldsmith  had  kept  to 
this  vein  of   familiar  causerie,  the  public  might  in  time 


84  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

have  been  attracted  by  its  quaintness.  But  nc  doubt 
Mr.  Wilkie  would  have  stared  aghast;  and  so  we  find 
Goldsmith,  as  soon  as  his  introductory  bow  is  made,  set- 
ting seriously  about  the  business  of  magazine-making. 
Very  soon,  however,  both  Mr.  Wilkie  and  his  editor  per- 
ceived that  the  public  had  not  been  taken  by  their  venture. 
The  chief  cause  of  the  failure,  as  it  appears  to  any  one 
who  looks  over  the  magazine  now,  would  seem  to  be  the 
lack  of  any  definite  purpose.  There  was  no  marked 
feature  to  arrest  public  attention,  while  many  things  were 
discarded  on  which  the  popularity  of  other  periodicals 
had  been  based.  There  was  no  scandal  to  appeal  to  the 
key-hole  and  back-door  element  in  human  nature;  there 
were  no  libels  and  gross  personalities  to  delight  the  mean 
and  envious;  there  were  no  fine  airs  of  fashion  to  charm 
milliners  anxious  to  know  how  the  great  talked,  and  posed, 
and  dressed;  and  there  was  no  solemn  and  pompous  erudi- 
tion to  impress  the  minds  of  those  serious  and  sensible 
people  who  buy  literature  as  they  buy  butter — by  its  weight. 
At  the  beginning  of  No.  IV  he  admits  that  the  new  maga« 
zine  has  not  been  a  success,  and,  in  doing  so,  returns  to 
that  vein  of  whimsical,  personal  humor  with  which  he  had 
started:  *' Were  I  to  measure  the  merit  of  my  present 
undertaking  by  its  success  or  the  rapidity  of  its  sale,  I 
might  be  led  to  form  conclusions  by  no  means  favorable  to 
the  pride  of  an  author.  Should  I  estimate  my  fame  by  its 
extent,  every  newspaper  and  magazine  would  leave  me  far 
behind.  Their  fame  is  diffused  in  a  very  wide  circle — that 
of  some  as  far  as  Islington,  and  some  yet  further  still; 
while  mine,  I  sincerely  believe,  has  hardly  traveled  beyond 
the  sound  of  Bow  Bell;  and,  while  the  works  of  others  fly 
like  unpinioned  swans,  I  find  my  own  move  as  heavily  as  a 
new-plucked  goose.  Still,  however,  I  have  as  much  pride 
as  they  who  have  ten  times  as  many  readers.  It  is  impos- 
sible to  repeat  all  the  agreeable  delusions  in  which  a  disap- 
pointed author  is  apt  to  find  comfort.  I  conclude,  that 
what  my  reputation  wants  in  extent  is  made  up  by  its  so- 
lidity. Mintis  juvat  gloria  lata  quam  magna.  I  have 
great  satisfaction  in  considering  the  delicacy  and  discern- 
ment of  those  readers  I  have,  and  in  ascribing  my  want 
of  popularity  to  the  ignorance  or  inattention  of  those  I  have 
not.     All  the  world  may  forsake  an  author,  but  vanity  will 


BEGINNING  09  A  UTEOBSHIP—TEE  BEE.  35 

never  forsake  him.  Yet,  notwithstanding  so  sincere  a  con- 
fession, I  was  once  induced  to  show  my  indignation  against 
the  public  by  discontinuing  my  endeavors  to  please;  and 
was  bravely  resolved,  like  Raleigh,  to  vex  them  by  burning 
my  manuscript  in  a  passion.  IJpon  recollection,  however, 
I  considered  what  set  or  body  of  people  would  be  displeased 
at  my  rashness.  The  sun,  after  so  sad  an  accident,  might 
shine  next  morning  as  bright  as  usual;  men  might  laugh 
and  sing  the  next  day  and  transact  business  as  before,  and 
not  a  single  creature  feel  any  regret  but  myself." 

Goldsmith  was  certainly  more  at  home  in  this  sort  of 
writing  than  in  gravely  lecturing  people  against  the  vice  of 
gambling;  in  warning  tradesmen  how  ill  it  became  them  to 
be  seen  at  races;  in  demonstrating  that  justice  is  a  higher 
virtue  than  generosity;  and  in  proving  that  the  avaricious 
are  the  true  benefactors  of  society.  But  even  as  he  con- 
fesses the  failure  of  his  new  magazine,  he  seenrs  determined 
to  show  the  public  what  sort  of  writer  this  is,  whom  as  yet 
they  have  not  regarded  too  favorably.  It  is  in  No.  IV  of 
the  Bee  that  the  famous  City  Night  Piece  occurs.  No 
doubt  that  strange  little  fragment  of  description  was  the 
result  of  some  sudden  and  aimless  fancy,  striking  the  occu- 
pant of  the  lonely  garret  in  the  middle  of  the  night.  The 
present  tense,  which  he  seldom  used — and  the  abuse  of 
which  is  one  of  the  detestable  vices  of  modern  literature — 
adds  to  the  mysterious  solemnity  of  the  recital: 

"  The  clock  has  just  struck  two,  the  expiring  taper  rises 
and  sinks  in  the  socket,  the  Avatchman  forgets  the  hour  in 
slumber,  the  laborious  and  the  happy  are  at  rest,  and  noth- 
ing wakes  but  meditation,  guilt,  revelry  and  despair.  The 
drunkard  once  more  fills  the  destroying  bowl,  the  robber 
walks  his  midnight  round,  and  the  suicide  lifts  his  guilty 
arm  against  his  own  sacred  person. 

"  Let  me  no  longer  waste  the  night  over  the  page  of  an- 
tiquity or  the  sallies  of  contemporary  genius,  but  pursue 
the  solitary  walk,  where  Vanity,  ever  changing,  but  a  few 
hours  past  walked  before  me — where  she  kept  up  the 
pageant,  and  now,  like  a  froward  child,  seems  hushed  with 
her  own  importunities. 

"What  a  gloom  hangs  all  around!  The  dying  lamp 
feebly  emits  a  yellow  gleam;  no  sound  is  heard  but  of  tlie 
chiming  clock  or  the  distant  watch-dog.     All  the  bustle  of 


86  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

human  pride  is  forgotten;  an  hour  like  this  may  well  dis- 
play the  emptiness  of  human  vanity. 

"  There  will  come  a  time  when  this  temporary  solitude 
may  be  made  continual,  and  the  city  itself,  like  its  inhabi- 
tants, fade  away,  and  leave  a  desert  in  its  room. 

''What  cities,  as  great  as  this,  have  once  triumphed  in 
existence,  had  their  victories  as  great,  Joy  as  just  and  as 
unbounded;  and,  with  short-sighted  presumption,  prom- 
ised themselves  immortality!  Posterity  can  hardly  trace 
the  situation  of  some;  the  sorrowful  traveler  wanders  over 
the  awful  ruins  of  others;  and,  as  he  beholds,  he  learns 
wisdom,  and  feels  the  transience  of  every  sublunary  pos- 
session. 

"  'Here,'  he  cries,  'stood  their  citadel,  now  grown  over 
with  weeds;  there  their  senate-house,  but  now  the  haunt  of 
every  noxious  reptile;  temples  and  theaters  stood  here, 
now  only  an  undistinguished  heap  of  ruin.  They  are 
fallen,  for  luxury  and  avarice  first  made  them  feeble.  The 
rewards  of  the  state  were  conferred  on  amusing,  and  not 
on  useful,  members  of  society.  Their  riches  and  opulence 
invited  the  invaders,  who,  though  at  first  repulsed, 
returned  again,  conquered  by  perseverance,  and  at  last 
swept  the  defendants  into  undistinguished  destruction.'^ 


FERaONAL  TRAITS,  87 


CHAPTER  VI. 

PERSONAL   TRAITS. 

The  foregoing  extracts  will  sufficiently  show  what  were 
the  chief  characteristics  of  Goldsmith's  writing  at  this 
time — the  grace  and  ease  of  style,  a  gentle  and  some- 
times pathetic  thoughtfulness,  and,  above  all,  when  he 
speaks  in  the  first  person,  a  delightful  vein  of  humorous 
self-disclosure.  Moreover,  these  qualities,  if  they  were  not 
immediately  profitable  to  the  book-sellers,  were  beginning 
to  gain  for  him  the  recognition  of  some  of  the  well-known 
men  of  the  day.  Percy,  afterward  Bishop  of  Dromore, 
had  made  his  way  to  the  miserable  garret  of  the  poor 
author.  Smollett,  whose  novels  Goldsmith  preferred  to 
his  History,  was  anxious  to  secure  his  services  as  a 
contributor  to  the  forthcoming  British  Magazine.  Burke 
had  spoken  of  the  pleasure  given  him  by  Goldsmith's 
review  of  the  Enquiry  into  the  Origin  of  our  Ideas 
of  the  Sublitne  and  Beautiful.  But,  to  crown  all,  the 
great  Cham  himself  sought  out  this  obscure  author, 
who  had  on  several  occasions  spoken  with  reverence  and 
admiration  of  his  works;  and  so  began  what  is  perhaps 
the  most  interesting  literary  friendship  on  record.  At 
what  precise  date  Johnson  first  made  Goldsmith's 
acquaintance  is  not  known;  Mr.  Forster  is  right  in  assum- 
ing that  they  had  met  before  the  supper  in  Wine-Office 
Court,  at  which  Mr.  Percy  was  present.  It  is  a  thousand 
pities  that  Boswell  had  not  by  this  time  made  his  appear- 
ance in  London.  Johnson,  Goldsmith,  and  all  the  rest  of 
them  are  only  ghosts  until  the  pertinacious  young  laird  of 
Auchinleck  comes  on  the  scene  to  give  them  color,  and  life, 
and  form.  It  is  odd  enough  that  the  very  first  remarks  of 
Goldsmith's  which  Boswell  jotted  down  in  his  note-book 
should  refer  to  Johnson's  systematic  kindness  toward  the 
poor  and  wretched.     "  He  had  increased  my  admiration  of 


38  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH, 

the  goodness  of  Johnson's  heart  by  incidental  remarks  in 
the  course  of  conversation,  such  as,  when  I  mentioned  Mr. 
Levett,  whom  he  entertained  under  his  roof,  ^  He  is  poor 
and  honest,  which  is  recommendation  enough  to  Johnson;' 
and  when  I  wondered  that  he  was  very  kind  to  a  man  of 
whom  I  had  heard  a  very  bad  character,  *  He  is  now  become 
miserable,  and  that  insures  the  protection  of  Johnson/" 

For  the  rest,  Boswell  was  not  well-disposed  toward  Gold- 
smith, whom  he  regarded  with  a  jealousy  equal  to  his 
admiration  of  Johnson;  but  it  is  probable  that  his  descrip- 
tion of  the  personal  appearance  of  the  awkward  and  un- 
gainly Irishman  is  in  the  main  correct.  And  here  also  it 
may  be  said  that  Boswell's  love  of  truth  and  accuracy  com- 
pelled him  to  make  this  admission:  "\i  has  been  gener- 
ally circulated  and  believed  that  he  (Goldsmith)  was  a  mere 
fool  in  conversation;  but,  in  truth,  this  has  been  greatly 
exaggerated."  On  this  exaggeration — seeing  that  the  con- 
tributor to  the  British  Magazine  and  the  Public  Ledger 
was  now  becoming  better  known  among  his  fellow  authors 
— a  word  or  two  may  fitly  be  said  here.  It  pleased  Gold- 
smith's contemporaries,  who  were  not  all  of  them  celebrated 
for  their  ready  wit,  to  regard  him  as  a  hopeless  and  incur- 
able fool,  who  by  some  strange  chance  could  produce  liter- 
ature, the  merits  of  which  he  could  not  himself  under- 
stand. To  Horace  Walpole  we  owe  the  phrase  which  de- 
scribes Goldsmith  as  an  "inspired  idiot."  Innumerable 
stories  are  told  of  Goldsmith's  blunders;  of  his  forced  at- 
tempts to  shine  in  conversation;  of  poor  Poll  talking  non- 
sense, when  all  the  world  was  wondering  at  the  beauty  of 
his  writing.  In  one  case  we  are  told  he  was  content  to 
admit,  when  dictated  to,  that  this,  and  not  that,  was  what 
he  really  had  meant  in  a  particular  phrase.  Now  there  can 
be  no  question  that  Goldsmith,  conscious  of  his  pitted  face, 
his  brogue,  and  his  ungainly  figure,  was  exceedingly  ner- 
vous and  sensitive  in  society,  and  was  anxious,  as  such  peo- 
ple mostly  are,  to  cover  his  shyness  by  an  appearance  of 
ease,  if  not  even  of  swagger;  and  there  can  be  as  little 
question  that  he  occasionally  did  and  said  very  awkward 
and  blundering  things.  But  our  Japanese  friend,  whom 
we  mentioned  in  our  opening  pages,  looking  through  the 
record  that  is  preserved  to  us  of  those  blunders  which  are 
supposed  to  be  most  conclusive  as  to  this  aspect  of  Gold- 


PERSONAL  TRAITS.  39 

gmith's  character,  would  certainly  stare.  "  Good  heavens/* 
he  would  cry,  "did  men  ever  live  who  were  so  thick-headed 
as  not  to  see  the  humor  of  this  or  that  '  blunder  ;'  or  were 
they  so  beset  with  the  notion  that  Goldsmith  was  only  a 
fool,  that  they  must  needs  be  blind?"  Take  one  well- 
known  instance.  He  goes  to  France  with  Mrs.  Horneck 
and  her  two  daughters,  the  latter  very  handsome  young 
ladies.  At  Lille  the  two  girls  and  Goldsmith  are  standing 
at  the  window  of  the  hotel,  overlooking  the  square  in  which 
are  some  soldiers  ;  and  naturally  the  beautiful  young  Eng- 
lish-women attract  some  attention.  Thereupon  Goldsmith 
turns  indignantly  away,  remarking  that  elsewhere  he  also 
has  his  admirers.  Now  what  surgical  instrument  was 
needed  to  get  this  harmless  little  joke  into  any  sane  per- 
son's head?  Boswell  may  perhaps  be  pardoned  for  pre- 
tending to  take  the  incident  mi  serietix;  for  as  has  just 
been  said,  in  his  profound  adoration  of  Johnson,  he  was 
devoured  by  jealousy  of  Goldsmith;  but  that  any  other 
mortal  should  have  failed  to  see  what  was  meant  by  this 
little  bit  of  humorous  flattery  is  almost  incredible.  No 
wonder  that  one  of  the  sisters  afterward  referring  to  this 
"  playful  jest,"  should  have  expressed  her  astonishment  at 
finding  it  put  down  as  a  proof  of  Goldsmith's  envious  dis- 
position. But  even  after  that  disclaimer,  we  find  Mr. 
Croker,  as  quoted  by  Mr.  Forster,  solemnly  doubting 
**  whether  the  vexation  so  seriously  exhibited  by  Goldsmith 
was  real  or  assumed  !" 

Of  course  this  is  an  extreme  case;  but  there  are  others 
very  similar.  "He  affected,"  says  Hawkins,  "Johnson's 
style  and  manner  of  conversation,  and  when  he  had  uttered, 
as  he  often  would,  a  labored  sentence,  so  tumid  as  to  be 
scarce  intelligible,  would  ask  if  that  was  not  truly  John- 
sonian?" Is  it  not  truly  dismal  to  find  such  an  utterance 
coming  from  a  presumably  reasonable  human  being?  It 
is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  Goldsmith  grew  shy — and  in 
some  cases  had  to  ward  off  the  acquaintance  of  certain  of 
his  neighbors  as  being  too  intrusive — if  he  ran  the  risk  of 
having  his  odd  and  grave  humors  so  densely  mistrans- 
lated. The  fact  is  this,  that  Goldsmith  was  possessed  of  a 
very  subtle  quality  of  humor,  which  is  at  all  times  rare, 
but  which  is  perhaps  more  frequently  to  be  found  in  Irish- 
men than  among  other  folks.     It  consists  in  the  satire  of 


40  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

the  pretence  and  pomposities  of  others  by  means  of  a  sort 
of  exaggerated  and  playful  self-depreciation.  It  is  a  most 
delicate  and  most  delightful  form  of  humor;  but  it  is  very 
apt  to  be  misconstrued  by  the  dull.  Who  can  doubt  that 
Goldsmith  was  good-naturedly  laughing  at  himself^  his 
own  Dlain  face,  his  vanity,  and  his  blunders,  when  he  pro- 
fessed to  be  jealous  of  the  admiration  excited  by  the  Miss 
Hornecks;  when  he  gravely  drew  attention  to  the  splendid 
colors  of  his  coat;  or  when  he  no  less  gravely  informed  a 
company  of  his  friends  that  he  had  heard  a  very  good 
story,  but  would  not  repeat  it,  because  they  would  be  sure 
to  miss  the  point  of  it? 

This  vein  of  playful  and  sarcastic  self-depreciation  is 
continually  cropping  up  in  his  essay-writing,  as,  for  ex- 
ample, in  the  passage  already  quoted  from  No.  IV  of  the 
Bee:  "I  conclude  that  what  my  reputation  wants  in  ex- 
tent is  made  up  by  its  solidity.  Minus  juvat  gloria  lata 
quam  magna.  I  have  great  satisfaction  in  considering  the 
delicacy  and  discernment  of  those  readers  I  have,  and  in 
ascribing  my  want  of  popularity  to  the  ignorance  or  inat- 
tention of  those  I  have  not."  But  here,  no  doubt,  he  re- 
members that  he  is  addressing  the  world  at  large,  which 
contains  many  foolish  persons;  and  so,  that  the  delicate 
raillery  may  not  be  mistaken,  he  immediately  adds,  ''All 
the  world  may  forsake  an  author,  but  vanity  will  never 
forsake  him."  That  he  expected  a  quicker  apprehension 
on  the  part  of  his  intimates  and  acquaintances,  and  that 
he  was  frequently  disappointed,  seems  pretty  clear  from 
those  very  stories  of  his  "  blunders."  We  may  reasonably 
suspect,  at  all  events,  that  Goldsmith  was  not  quite  so 
much  of  a  fool  as  he  looked;  and  it  is  far  from  improbable 
that  when  the  ungainly  Irishman  was  called  in  to  make 
sport  for  the  Philistines — and  there  were  a  good  many 
Philistines  in  those  days,  if  all  stories  be  true — and  when 
they  imagined  they  had  put  him  out  of  countenance,  he 
was  really  standing  aghast,  and  wondering  how  it  could 
have  pleased  Providence  to  create  such  helpless  stupidity. 


TME  CITIZEN  OF  THE  WORLD— BEAU  NA8H.      41 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  CITIZElf  OF  THE  WORLD — BEAU   N'ASH. 

Meanwhile,  to  return  to  his  literary  work,  the  Citizen 
of  the  World  had  grown  out  of  his  contributions  to  the 
Public  Ledger,  a  daily  newspaper  started  by  Mr.  Newbery, 
another  book-seller  in  St.  Paul's  Church-yard.  Goldsmith 
was  engaged  to  write  for  this  jDaper  two  letters  a  week  at  a 
guinea  apiece;  and  these  letters  were,  after  a  short  time 
(1760),  written  in  the  character  of  a  Chinese  who  had  come 
to  study  European  civilization.  It  may  be  noted  that 
Goldsmith  had  in  the  Monthly  Revieio,  in  mentioning  Vol- 
taire's memoirs  of  French  writers,  quoted  a  passage  about 
Montesquieu's  Lettres  Persanes  as  follows:  "It  is  written 
in  imitation  of  the  Siamese  Letters  of  Du  Freny  and  of  the 
Turkish  Spy;  but  it  is  an  imitation  Avhicli  shows  what  the 
originals  should  have  been.  The  success  their  works  met 
with  was,  for  the  most  part,  owing  to  the  foreign  air  of 
their  performances;  the  success  of  the  Persian  Letters 
arose  from  the  delicacy  of  their  satire.  That  satire  which 
in  the  mouth  of  an  Asiatic  is  poignant,  would  lose  all  its 
force  when  coming  from  an  European."  And  it  must  cer- 
tainly be  said  that  the  charm  of  the  strictures  of  the  Citi- 
zen of  the  World  lies  wholly  in  their  delicate  satire,  and  not 
at  all  in  any  foreign  air  which  the  author  may  have  tried 
to  lend  to  these  performances.  The  disguise  is  very  appar- 
ent. In  those  garrulous,  vivacious,  whimsical,  and  some- 
times serious  papers.  Lien  Chi  Altangi,  writing  to  Fum 
Hoam  in  Pekin,  does  not  so  much  describe  the  aspects  of 
European  civilization  which  would  naturally  surprise  a 
Chinese,  as  he  expresses  the  dissatisfaction  of  a  European 
with  certain  phases  of  the  civilization  visible  everywhere 
around  him.  It  is  not  a  Chinaman,  but  a  Fleet-street 
author  by  profession,  who  resents  the  competition  of 
noble  amateurs  whose  works — otherwise  bitter  pills  enough 


42  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

— are  guided  by  their  titles:  '*  A  nobleman  has  but  to  take 
a  pen,  ink,  and  paper,  write  away  through  three  large  vol- 
umes, and  then  sign  his  name  to  the  title-page;  though 
the  whole  might  have  been  before  more  disgusting  than  his 
own  rent-roll,  yet  signing  his  name  and  title  gives  value  to 
the  deed,  title  being  alone  equivalent  to  taste,  imagination 
and  genius.  As  soon  as  a  piece,  therefore,  is  published, 
the  first  questions  are:  Who  is  the  author?  Does  he  keep 
a  coach?  Where  lies  his  estate?  What  sort  of  a  table 
does  he  keep?  If  he  happens  to  be  poor  and  unqualified 
for  such  a  scrutiny,  he  and  his  works  sink  into  irremedi- 
able obscurity,  and  too  late  he  finds,  that  having  fed  upon 
turtle  is  a  more  ready  way  to  fame  than  having  digested 
Tully.  The  poor  devil  against  whom  fashion  has  set  its 
face  vainly  alleges  that  he  has  been  bred  in  every  part  of 
Europe  where  knowledge  was  to  be  sold;  that  he  has  grown 
pale  in  the  study  of  nature  and  himself.  His  works  may 
please  upon  the  perusal,  but  his  pretentions  to  fame  are 
entirely  disregarded.  He  is  treated  like  a  fiddler,  whose 
music,  though  liked,  is  not  much  praised,  because  he  lives 
by  it;  while  a  gentleman  performer,  though  the  most 
wretched  scraper  alive,  throws  the  audience  into  raptures. 
The  fiddler,  indeed,  may  in  such  a  ease  console  himself 
by  thinking,  that  while  the  other  goes  ofE  with  all  the 
praise,  he  runs  away  with  all  the  money.  But  here  the 
parallel  drops;  for  while  the  nobleman  triumphs  in  un- 
merited applause,  the  author  by  profession  steals  off  with — 
nothing." 

At  the  same  time  it  must  be  allowed  that  the  utterance 
of  these  strictures  through  the  mouth  of  a  Chinese  admits 
of  a  certain  naivete,  which  on  occasion  heightens  the  sar- 
casm. Lien  Chi  accompanies  the  Man  in  Black  to  a 
theater  to  see  an  English  play.  Here  is  part  of  the  per- 
formance: "1  was  going  to  second  his  remarks,  when  my 
attention  was  engrossed  by  a  new  object;  a  man  came  in 
balancing  a  straw  upon  his  nose,  and  the  audience  were 
clapping  their  hands  in  all  the  raptures  of  applause.  '  To 
what  purpose,'  cried  I,  '  does  this  unmeaning  figure  make 
his  appearance?  is  he  a  part  of  the  plot?'  'Unmeaning 
do  you  call  him?'  replied  my  friend  in  black;  Hhis  is  one 
of  the  most  important  characters  of  the  play;  nothing 
pleases  the  people  more  than  seeing  a  straw  balanced:  there 


THE  CITIZEN  OF  TEE  WORLD— BEA  U  NASH.       43 

is,  a  great  deal  of  meaning  in  a  straw:  there  is  something 
suited  to  every  apprehension  in  the  sight;  and  a  fellow 
possessed  of  talents  like  these  is  sure  of  making  his  fort- 
une/ The  third  act  now  began  with  an  actor  who  came 
to  inform  us  that  he  was  the  villain  of  the  play,  and 
intended  to  show  strange  things  before  all  was  over.  He 
was  joined  by  another  who  seemed  as  much  disposed  for 
mischief  as  he;  their  intrigues  continued  through  this 
whole  division.  *  If  that  be  a  villain,'  said  I,  'he 
must  be  a  very  stupid  one  to  tell  his  secrets  without 
being  asked;  such  soliloquies  of  late  are  never  admitted 
in  China.'  The  noise  of  clapping  interrupted  me  once 
more ;  a  child  six  years  old  was  learning  to  dance 
on  the  stage,  which  gave  the  ladies  and  mandarins  infinite 
satisfaction,  *I  am  sorry,'  said  I,  ^to  see  the  pretty  crea- 
ture so  early  learning  so  bad  a  trade;  dancing  being,  I  pre- 
sume, as  contemptible  here  as  in  China.'  'Quite  the 
reverse,'  interrupted  my  companion;  '  dancing  is  a  very 
reputable  and  genteel  employment  here;  men  have  a  greater 
chance  for  encouragement  from  the  merit  of  their  heels 
than  their  heads.  One  who  jumps  up  and  flourishes  his 
toes  three  times  before  he  comes  to  the  ground  may  have 
three  hundred  a  year;  he  who  flourishes  them  four  times 
gets  four  hundred;  but  he  who  arrives  at  five  is  inestimable, 
and  may  demand  what  salary  he  thinks  proper.  The  female 
dancers,  too,  are  valued  for  this  sort  of  jumping  and  cross- 
ing; and  it  is  a  cant  word  among  them,  that  she  deserves 
most  who  shows  highest.  But  the  fourth  act  is  begun;  let 
us  be  attentive,'" 

The  Man  in  Black  here  mentioned  is  one  of  the  notable 
features  of  this  series  of  papers.  The  mysterious  person 
whose  acquaintance  the  Chinaman  made  in  Westminster 
Abbey,  and  who  concealed  such  a  wonderful  goodness  of 
heart  under  a  rough  and  forbidding  exterior,  is  a  charming 
character  indeed;  and  it  is  impossible  to  praise  too  highly 
the  vein  of  subtle  sarcasm  in  which  he  preaches  worldly 
wisdom.  But  to  assume  that  any  part  of  his  history  which 
he  disclosed  to  the  Chinaman  was  a  piece  of  autobiograph- 
ical writing  on  the  part  of  Goldsmith,  is  a  very  hazardous 
thing.  A  writer  of  fiction  must  necessarily  use  such  mate- 
rials as  have  come  within  his  own  experience;  and  Gold- 
smith's experience  —  or  his  use   of   those   materials — was 


44  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

extremely  limited:  witness  how  often  a  pet  fancy,  like  his 
remembrance  of  Johnny  Armstrong's  Last  Good  Night,  is 
repeated.  "  That  of  tiiese  simple  elements/'  writes  Pro- 
fessor Masson,  in  his  Memoir  of  Goldsmith,  prefixed  to  an 
edition  of  his  works,  "  he  made  so  many  charming  combi- 
nations, really  differing  from  each  other,  and  all,  though 
suggested  by  fact,  yet  hung  so  sweetly  in  an  ideal  air, 
proved  what  an  artist  he  was,  and  was  better  than  much 
that  is  commonly  called  invention.  In  short,  if  there  is  a 
sameness  of  effect  in  Goldsmith's  writings,  it  is  because 
they  consist  of  poetry  and  truth,  humor  and  pathos,  from 
his  own  life,  and  the  supply  from  such  a  life  as  his  was  not 
inexhaustible." 

The  question  of  invention  is  easily  disposed  of.  Any 
child  can  invent  a  world  transcending  human  experience 
by  the  simj)le  combination  of  ideas  which  are  in  themselves 
incongruous — a  world  in  which  the  horses  have  each  five 
feet,  in  which  the  grass  is  blue  and  the  sky  green,  in  which 
seas  are  balanced  on  the  jjeaks  of  mountains.  The  result 
is  unbelievable  and  worthless.  But  the  writer  of  imagina- 
tive literature  uses  his  own  experiences  and  the  experiences 
of  others,  so  that  his  combination  of  ideas  in  themselves 
compatible  shall  appear  so  natural  and  believable  that  the 
reader — although  these  incidents  and  characters  never  did 
actually  ( xist — is  as  much  interested  in  them  as  if  they  had 
existed.  The  mischief  of  it  is  that  the  reader  sometimes 
thinks  himself  very  clever,  and,  recognizing  a  little  bit  of 
the  story  as  having  happened  to  the  author,  jumps  to  the 
conclusion  that  such  and  such  a  passage  is  necessarily  auto- 
biographical. Hence  it  is  that  Goldsmith  has  been  hastily 
identified  with  the  Philosophic  Vagabond  in  the  Vicar  of 
Wakefield,  and  with  the  Man  in  Black  in  the  Citizen  of 
the  World.  That  he  may  have  used  certain  experiences 
in  the  one,  and  that  he  may  perhaps  have  given  in  the 
other  a  sort  of  fancy  sketch  of  a  person  suggested  by  some 
trait  in  his  own  character,  is  possible  enough;  but  further 
assertion  of  likeness  is  impossible.  That  the  Man  in 
Black  had  one  of  Goldsmith's  little  weaknesses  is  obvious 
enough:  we  find  him  just  a  trifle  too  conscious  of  his  own 
kindliness  and  generosity.  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield  him- 
self is  not  without  a  spice  of  this  amiable  vanity.  As  for 
Goldsmith,  every  one  must  remember  his  reply  to  Grifllths' 


THE  CITIZEN  OF  THE  WORLD— BEA  V  NASH.       45 

accusation:  "  No,  sir,  had  I  been  a  sharper,  had  I  been 
possessed  of  less  good  nature  a7id  native  generosity,  I  might 
surely  now  have  been  in  better  circumstances/' 

The  Man  in  Black,  in  any  case,  is  a  delightful  character. 
We  detect  the  warm  and  generous  nature  even  in  his  pre 
tense  of  having  acquired  worldly  wisdom;  "I  now  therefore 
pursued  a  course  of  uninterrupted  frugality,  seldom 
wanted  a  dinner,  and  was  consequently  invited  to  twenty. 
I  soon  began  to  get  the  character  of  a  saving  hunks  that 
had  money,  and  insensibly  grew  into  esteem.  Neighbors 
have  asked  my  advice  in  the  disposal  of  their  daughters; 
and  I  have  always  taken  care  not  to  give  any.  I  have  con- 
tracted a  friendship  with  an  alderman,  only  by  observing, 
that  if  we  take  a  farthing  from  a  thousand  pounds  it  will 
be  a  thousand  pounds  no  longer.  I  have  been  invited  to  a 
pawnbroker's  table,  by  pretending  to  hate  gravy;  and  am 
now  actually  upon  treaty  of  marriage  with  a  rich  widow, 
for  only  having  observed  that  the  bread  was  rising.  If 
ever  I  am  asked  a  question,  whether  I  know  it  or  not,  in- 
stead .of  answering,  I  only  smile  and  look  wise.  If  a 
charity  is  proposed,  I  go  about  with  the  hat,  but  put  noth- 
ing in  myself.  If  a  wretch  solicits  my  pity,  I  observe  that 
the  world  is  filled  with  impostors,  and  take  a  certain 
method  of  not  being  deceived  by  never  relieving.  In 
short,  I  now  find  the  truest  way  of  finding  esteem,  even 
from  the  indigent,  is  to  give  away  nothing,  and  thus  have 
much  in  our  power  to  give."  This  is  a  very  clever  piece  of 
writing,  whether  it  is  in  strict  accordance  with  the  char- 
acter of  the. Man  in  Black  or  not.  But  there  is  in  these 
Public  Ledger  papers  another  sketch  of  character,  which  is 
not  only  consistent  in  itself,  and  in  every  way  admirable, 
but  is  of  still  further  interest  to  us  when  we  remember  that 
at  this  time  the  various  personages  in  the  Vicar  of  Wake- 
field were  no  doubt  gradually  assuming  definite  form  in 
Goldsmith's  mind.  It  is  in  the  figure  of  Mr.  Tibbs,  intro- 
duced apparently  at  haphazard,  but  at  once  taking  posses- 
sion of  us  by  its  quaint  relief,  that  we  find  Goldsmith 
showing  a  firmer  hand  in  character-drawing.  With  a  few 
happy  dramatic  touches  Mr.  Tibbs  starts  into  life;  ho 
speaks  for  himself;  he  becomes  one  of  the  people  whom  we 
kuow.  And  yet,  with  this  concise  and  sharp  portraiture 
of  a  human  being,  look  at  the  graceful,  almost  garrulous, 
ease  of  the  style: 


46  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

*^  Our  pursuer  soon  came  up  and  joined  us  with  all  the 
familiarity  of  an  old  acquaintance.  ^  My  dear  Drybone,' 
cries  he,  shaking  my  friend's  hand,  *  where  have  you  been 
hiding  this  half  a  century?  Positively  I  had  fancied  you 
were  gone  to  cultivate  matrimony  and  your  estate  in  the 
country.'  During  the  reply  I  had  an  opportunity  of 
surveying  the  appearance  of  our  new  companion:  his  hat 
was  pinched  up  with  peculiar  smartness;  his  looks  were 
pale,  thin,  and  sharp;  round  his  neck  he  wore  a  broad 
black  ribbon,  and  in  his  bosom  a  buckle  studded  with 
glass;  his  coat  was  trimmed  with  tarnished  twist;  he 
wore  by  his  side  a  sword  with  a  black  hilt;  and  his 
stockings  of  silk,  though  newly  washed,  were  grown  yel- 
low by  long  service.  I  was  so  much  engaged  with  the 
peculiarity  of  his  dress,  that  I  attended  only  to  the  latter 
part  of  my  friend's  reply,  in  which  he  complimented  Mr. 
Tibbs  on  the  taste  of  his  clothes  and  the  bloom  in  his 
countenance.  'Pshaw,  pshaw.  Will,' cried  the  figure,  'no 
more  of  that,  if  you  love  me:  you  know  I  hate  flattery — 
on  my  soul  I  do;  and  yet,  to  be  sure,  an  intimacy  with 
the  great  will  improve  one's  appearance,  and  a  course  of 
venison  will  fatten;  and  yet,  faith  I  despise  the  great  as 
much  as  you  do;  but  there  are  a  great  many  damned  honest 
fellows  among  them,  and  we  must  not  quarrel  with  one- 
half  because  the  other  wants  weeding.  If  they  were  all 
such  as  my  Lord  Mudler,  one  of  the  most  good-natured 
creatures  that  ever  squeezed  a  lemon,  I  should  myself  be 
among  the  number  of  their  admirers.  I  was  yesterday  to 
dine  at  the  Duchess  of  Piccadilly's.  My  lord  was  there. 
**  Ned,"  says  he  to  me,  ''  Ned,"  says  he,  "  I'll  hold  gold  to 
silver,  I  can  tell  you  where  you  were  poaching  last  night." 
''Poaching,  my  lord?"  says  I;  "faith,  you  have  missed 
already;  for  I  stayed  at  home  and  let  the  girls  poach 
for  me.  That's  my  way:  I  take  a  fine  woman  as  some 
animals  do  their  prey — stand  still,  and,  swoop,  they 
fall  into  my  mouth."'  'Ah,  Tibbs,  thou  art  a  happy 
fellow,'  cried  my  companion,  with  looks  of  infinite  pity; 
'  I  hope  your  fortune  is  as  much  improved  as  your  under- 
standmg,  in  such  company?'  'Improved!' replied  the  other; 
*you  shall  know — but  let  it  go  no  further — a  great  secret — 
five  hundred  a  year  to  begin  with — my  lord's  word  of  honor 
for  it.     His  lordship  took  me  down  in  his  own  chariot  yes- 


TEE  CITIZEN  OF  TEE  WORLD— BEA  U  NASE.       47 

terday,  and  we  had  a  tete-a-tete  dinner  in  the  country, 
where  we  talked  of  nothing  else.'  'I  fancy  you  forget, 
sir/  cried  I;  *you  told  us  but  this  moment  of  your  dining 
yesterday  in  town/  'Did  I  say  so?'  replied  he,  coolly;  '  to 
be  sure,  if  I  said  so,  it  was  so.  Dined  in  town!  egad,  now 
I  do  remember,  I  did  dine  in  town;  but  I  dined  in  the  coun- 
try too;  for  you  must  know,  my  boys,  I  ate  two  dinners. 
By  the  by,  I  am  grown  as  nice  as  the  devil  in  my  eating. 
I'll  tell  you  a  pleasant  affair  about  that :  we  were  a  select 
party  of  us  to  dine  at  Lady  Program's — an  affected  piece, 
but  let  it  go  no  further — a  secret.  Well,  there  happened  to 
be  no  assafetida  in  the  sauce  to  a  turkey,  upon  which,  says 
I,  I'll  hold  a  thousand  guineas,  and  say  done,  first,  that — 
But,  dear  Dry  bone,  you  are  an  honest  creature;  lend  me 

half-a-crown  for  a  minute  or  two,  or  so,  just  till ;  but 

hearkee,  ask  me  for  it  the  next  time  we  meet,  or  it  may  be 
twenty  to  one  but  I  forget  to  pay  you.'" 

Keturning  from  these  performances  to  the  author  of 
them,  we  find  him  a  busy  man  of  letters,  becoming  more 
and  more  in  request  among  the  book-sellers  and  obtaining 
recognition  among  his  fellow-writers.  He  had  moved  into 
better  lodgings  in  Wine-Office  Court  (1760-2);  and  it  was 
here  that  he  entertained  at  supper,  as  has  already  been 
mentioned,  no  less  distinguished  guests  than  Bishop,  then 
Mr.,  Percy,  and  Dr.,  then  Mr.,  Johnson,  Every  one 
has  heard  of  the  surprise  of  Percy,  on  calling  for  John- 
son, to  find  the  great  Cham  dressed  with  quite  unusual 
smartness.  On  asking  the  cause  of  this  "singular  trans- 
formation," Johnson  replied,  "  AVhy  sir,  I  hear  that  Gold- 
smith, who  is  a  very  great  sloven,  justifies  his  disregard  of 
cleanliness  and  decency  by  quoting  my  practice;  and  I  am 
desirous  this  night  to  show  him  a  better  example." 
That  Goldsmith  profitted  by  this  example — though  the 
tailors  did  not — is  clear  enough.  At  times,  indeed,  he 
blossomed  out  into  the  splendors  of  a  dandy;  and  laughed 
at  himself  for  doing  so.  But  whether  he  was  in  gorgeous 
or  in  mean  attire,  he  remained  the  same  sort  of  happy-go- 
lucky  creature;  working  hard  by  tits  and  starts;  continually 
getting  money  in  advance  from  the  book-sellers;  enjoying 
the  present  hour;  and  apparently  happy  enough  when  not 
pressed  by  debt.  That  he  should  have  been  thus  pressed 
was  no  necessity  of  the  case;  at  all  events  we  need  not  on 


48  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

this  score  begin  now  to  abuse  the  book-sellers  or  the  public 
of  that  day.  We  may  dismiss  once  for  all  the  oft-repeated 
charges  of  ingratitude  and  neglect. 

When  Goldsmith  was  writing  those  letters  in  the  Public 
Ledger — with  "  pleasure  and  instruction  for  others,"  Mr. 
Forster  says,  "  though  at  the  cost  of  suffering  to  himself  " 
— he  was  receiving  for  them  alone  what  would  be  equiva- 
lent in  our  day  to  i)200  a  year.  No  man  can  affirm  that 
£200  a  year  is  not  amply  sufficient  for  all  the  material 
wants  of  life.  Of  course  there  are  fine  things  in  the  world 
that  that  amount  of  annual  wage  cannot  purchase.  It  is 
a  fine  thing  to  sit  on  the  deck  of  a  yacht  on  a  summer's 
day,  and  watch  the  far  islands  shining  over  the  blue;  it  is 
a  fine  thing  to  drive  four-in-hand  to  Ascot — if  you  can  do 
it;  it  is  a  fine  thing  to  cower  breathless  behind  a  rock  and 
find  a  splendid  stag  coming  slowly  within  sure  range.  But 
these  things  are  not  necessary  to  human  happiness:  it  is 
possible  to  do  without  them  and  yet  not  ''suffer.''  Even 
if  Goldsmith  had  given  half  of  his  substance  to  the  poor, 
there  was  enough  left  to  cover  all  the  necessary  wants  of 
a  human  being;  and  if  he  chose  so  to  order  his  affairs  as 
to  incur  the  suffering  of  debt,  why  that  was  his  own  busi- 
ness, about  which  nothing  further  needs  be  said.  It  is  to 
be  suspected,  indeed,  that  he  did  not  care  to  practise  those 
excellent  maxims  of  prudence  and  frugality  which  he  fre- 
quently preached;  but  the  world  is  not  much  concerned 
about  that  now.  If  Goldsmith  had  received  ten  times  as 
much  money  as  the  book-sellers  gave  him,  he  would  still 
have  died  in  debt.  And  it  is  just  possible  that  we  may 
exaggerate  Goldsmith's  sensitiveness  on  this  score.  He  had 
had  a  life-long  familiarity  with  duns  and  borrowing;  and 
seemed  very  contented  when  the  exigencies  of  the  hour 
were  tided  cvei".  An  angry  landlady  is  unpleasant,  and 
an  arrest  is  awkward;  but  in  comes  an  opportune  guinea, 
and  the  bottle  of  Maderia  is  opened  forthwith. 

In  these  rooms  in  Wine-Office  Court,  and  at  the  sugges- 
tion or  entreaty  of  Newbery,  Goldsmith  produced  a  good 
deal  of  miscellaneous  writing — pamphlets,  tracts,  compila- 
tions, and  what  not — of  a  more  or  less  marketable  kind. 
It  can  only  be  surmised  that  by  this  time  he  may  have 
formed  some  idea  of  producing  a  book  not  solely  meant  for 
the  markei.,  and  that  the  characters  in  the  Vicar  of  Wake- 


THE  CITIZEN  OF  THE  WORLD— BEA  U  NASH.       49 

iield  were  already  engaging  his  attention;  but  the  surmise 
oecomes  probable  enough  when  we  remember  that  his  pro- 
ject of  writing  the  Traveller,  which  was  not  published  till 
17G4-,  had  been  formed  as  far  back  as  1755,  while  he  was 
wandering  aimlessly  about  Europe,  and  that  a  sketch  of 
the  poem  was  actually  forwarded  by  him  then  to  his 
brother  Henry  in  Ireland,  But  in  the  meantime  this  hack- 
work, and  the  habits  of  life  connected  with  it,  began  to 
tell  on  Goldsmith's  health;  and  so,  for  a  time,  he  left 
London  (1762),  and  went  to  Tunbridge  and  then  to  Bath. 
It  is  scarcely  possible  that  his  modest  fame  had  preceded 
him  to  the  latter  place  of  fashion;  but  it  may  be  that  the 
distinguished  folk  of  the  town  received  this  friend  of 
the  great  Dr.  Johnson  with  some  small  measure  of  distinc- 
tion; for  we  find  that  his  next  published  work,  The  Life  of 
Richard  Nash,  Esq.,  is  respectfully  dedicated  to  the  ;^ight 
Worshipful  the  Mayor,  Eecorder,  Alderman  and  Common 
Council  of  the  City  of  Bath.  The  Life  of  the  recently 
deceased  Master  of  Ceremonies  was  published  anonymously 
(1762);  but  it  was  generally  understood  to  be  Goldsmith's; 
and  indeed  the  secret  of  the  authorship  is  revealed  in  every 
successive  line.  Among  the  minor  writings  of  Goldsmith 
there  is  none  more  delightful  than  this:  the  mock-heroic 
gravity,  the  half-familiar  contemptuous  good  nature  with 
which  he  composes  this  Funeral  March  of  a  Marionette, 
are  extremely  whimsical  and  amusing.  And  then  what  an 
admirable  picture  we  get  of  fashionable  English  society  in 
the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  when  Bath  and 
Nash  were  alike  in  the  heyday  of  their  glory— the  fine 
ladies  with  their  snuff-boxes,  and  their  passion  for  play, 
and  their  extremely  effective  language  when  they  got 
angry;  young  bucks  come  to  flourisli  awav  their  money, 
and  gain  by  their  losses  the  sympathy  of  the  fair;  sharpers 
on  the  lookout  for  guineas,  and  adventurers  on  the  lookout 
for  weak-minded  heiresses;  duchesses  writing  letters  in 
the  most  doubtful  English,  and  chairmen  swearing  at  any 
one  who  dared  to  walk  home  on  foot  at  night. 

No  doubt  the  Life  of  Beau  Nash  was  a  book-seller's  book, 
and  it  was  made  as  attractive  as  possible  by  the  recapitu- 
lation of  all  sorts  of  romantic  stories  about  Miss  S n, 

and  Mr.  C e,  and  Captain  K g;  but  throughout  we 

find  the  historian  very  much  inclined  to  laugh  at  his  hero. 


60  LIFE  OF  goldsmith: 

and  only  refraining  now  and  again  in  order  to  record  in 
serious  language  traits  indicative  of  the  real  goodness  of 
disposition  of  that  fop  and  gambler.  And  the  fine  ladies 
and  gentlemen,  who  lived  in  that  atmosphere  of  scandal, 
and  intrigue,  and  gambling,  are  also  from  time  to  time 
treated  to  a  little  decorous  and  respectful  raillery.  Who 
does  not  remember  the  famous  laws  of  polite  breeding 
written  out  by  Mr.  Nash — Goldsmith  hints  that  neither 
Mr.  Nash  nor  his  fair  correspondent  at  Blenheim,  the 
Duchess  of  Marlborough,  excelled  in  English  compo- 
sition— for  the  guidance  of  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  who 
were  under  the  sway  of  the  King  of  Bath?  "  But  were  we 
to  give  laws  to  a  nursery,  we  should  make  them  childish 
laws,"  Goldsmith  writes  gravely.  *'His  statues,  though 
stupid,  were  addressed  to  fine  gentlemen  and  ladies,  and 
were  probably  received  with  sympathetic  approbation.  It 
is  certain  they  were  in  general  religiously  observed  by  his 
subjects,  and  executed  by  him  with  impartiality;  neither 
rank  nor  fortune  shielded  the  refractory  from  his  resent- 
ment." Nash,  however,  was  not  content  with  prose  in 
enforcing  good  manners.  Having  waged  deadly  war 
against  the  custom  of  wearing  boots,  and  having  found  his 
ordinary  armory  of  no  avail  against  the  obduracy  of  the 
country  squires,  he  assailed  them  in  the  impassioned 
language  of  poetry,  and  produced  the  following  "  Invi- 
tation to  the  Assembly,"  which,  as  Goldsmith  remarks, 
was  highly  relished  by  the  nobility  at  Bath  on  account  of 
its  keenness,  severity,  and  particularly  its  good  rhymes. 

"  Come,  one  and  all,  to  Hoyden  Hall, 
For  there's  the  assembly  this  night; 

None  but  prude  fools 

Mind  manners  and  rules; 
We  Hoydens  do  decency  slight. 

Come,  trollops  and  slatterns, 

Cocked  hats  and  white  aprons. 
This  best  our  modesty  suits; 

For  why  should  not  we 

In  dress  be  as  free 
As  Hogs-Norton  squires  in  Boots  ?" 

The  sarcasm  was  too  much  for  the  squires,  who  yielded  in 
a  body;  and  when  any  stranger  through  inadvertence  pre- 
sented himself  in  the  assembly-rooms  in  boots,  Nash  was  so 
completely  master  of  tiie  situation  that  he  would  politely 


THE  CITIZEN  OF  THE  WORLD— BEA  U  NASH.       51 

Btep  np  to  the  intruder  and  suggest  that  he  had  forgotten 
his  horse. 

Goldsmith  does  not  magnify  the  intellectual  capacity  of 
his  hero;  but  he  gives  him  credit  for  a  sort  of  rude  wit 
that  was  sometimes  effective  enough.  His  physician,  for 
example,  having  called  on  him  to  see  whether  he  had  fol- 
lowed a  prescription  that  had  been  sent  him  the  previous 
day,  was  greeted  in  this  fashion:  "Followed  your  prescrip- 
tioned?  No.  Egad,  if  I  had,  I  should  have  broken  my 
neck,  for  I  flung  it  out  of  the  two  pair  of  stairs  window.^' 
For  the  rest,  this  diverting  biography  contains  some  excel- 
lent warnings  against  the  vice  of  gambling;  with  a  partic- 
ular account  of  the  manner  in  which  the  government  of 
the  day  tried  by  statute  after  statute  to  suppress  the  tables 
at  Tunbridge  and  Bath,  thereby  only  driving  tlie  sharpers 
to  new  subterfuges.  That  the  Beau  was  in  alliance  with 
sharpers,  or,  at  least,  that  he  was  a  sleeping  partner  in  the 
firm,  his  biographer  admits;  but  it  is  ui-ged  on  his  behalf 
tliat  he  was  the  most  generous  of  winners,  and  again  and 
again  interfered  to  prevent  the  ruin  of  some  gambler  by 
whose  folly  he  would  himself  have  profited.  His  constant 
charity  was  well  known;  the  money  so  lightly  come  by  was 
at  the  disposal  of  any  one  who  could  prefer  a  piteous  tale. 
Moreover  he  made  no  scruple  about  exacting  from  others 
that  charity  which  they  could  well  afford.  One  may  easily 
guess  who  was  the  duchess  mentioned  in  the  following 
story  of  Goldsmith's  narration: 

"  The  sums  he  gave  and  collected  for  the  Hospital  were 
great,  and  his  manner  of  doing  it  was  no  less  admirable. 
I  am  told  that  he  was  once  collecting  money  in  Wiltshire's 
room  for  that  purpose,  when  a  lady  entered,  who  is  more 
remarkable  for  her  wit  than  her  charity,  and  not  being  able 
to  pass  him  by  unobserved,  she  gave  him  a  pat  with  her 
fan,  and  said,  '  You  must  put  down  a  trifle  for  me,  Nash, 
for  I  have  no  money  in'  my  pocket.'  *  Yes,  madam,'  says 
he,  '  that  I  will  with  pleasure,  if  your  grace  will  tell  me 
when  to  stop;'  then  taking  an  handful  of  guineas  out  of 
his  pocket,  he  began  to  tell  them  into  his  white  hat — *  One, 

two,  three,  four,  five '     '  Hold,  hold!'  says  the  duchess, 

'consider  what  you  are  about.'  '  Consider  your  rank  and 
fortune,  madam,' says  Nash,  and  continues  telling — 'six, 
seven,  eight,  nine,  ten.'    Here  the  duchess  called  again, 

22— Q  &  Q— C 


52  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

and  seemed  angry.  '  Pray  compose  yourself,  madam/  cried 
Nash,  ^and  don't  interrupt  the  work  of  charity — eleven, 
twelve,  thirteen,  fourteen,  ^fteen/  Here  the  duchess, 
stormed,  and  caught  hold  of  his  hand.  '  Peace,  madam,' 
says  Nash,  '  you  shall  have  your  name  written  in  letters  of 
gold,  madam,  and  upon  the  front  of  the  building,  madam — 
gixteen,  seventeen,  eighteen,  nineteen,  twenty.'  'I  won't 
pay  a  farthing  more,'  says  the  duchess.  '  Charity  hides  a 
multitude  of  sins,'  replies  Nash — '  twenty-one,  twenty-two, 
twenty-three,  twenty-four,  twenty-five.'  '  Nash,'  says  she, 
*  I  protest  you  frighten  me  out  of  my  wits.  L — d,  I  shall 
die!'  '  Madam,  you  will  never  die  with  doing  good;  and  if 
you  do,  it  will  be  the  better  for  you,'  answered  Nash,  and 
was  about  to  proceed;  but  perceiving  her  grace  had  lost  all 
patience,  a  parley  ensued,  when  he,  after  much  altercation, 
agreed  to  stop  his  hand  and  compound  with  her  grace  for 
thirty  guineas.  The  duchess,  however,  seemed  displeased 
the  whole  evening,  and  when  he  came  to  the  table  where 
she  was  playing,  bid  him,  '  Stand  farther,  an  ugly  devil, 
for  she  hated  the  sight  of  him.'  But  her  grace  afterward 
having  a  run  of  good  luck  called  Nash  to  her.  '  Come,'  says 
she,  '  I  will  be  friends  with  you,  though  you  are  a  fool; 
and  to  let  you  see  I  am  not  angry,  there  is  ten  guineas 
more  for  your  charity.  But  this  I  insist  on,  that  neither 
my  name  nor  the  sum  shall  be  mentioned.'" 

At  the  ripe  age  of  eighty-seven  the  "beau  of  three  gen- 
erations "  breathed  his  last  (1761);  and,  though  he  had 
fallen  into  poor  ways,  there  were  those  alive  who  remem- 
bered his  former  greatness,  and  who  chronicled  it  in  a 
series  of  epitaphs  and  poetical  lamentations.  "  One  thing 
is  common  almost  with  all  of  them,"  says  Goldsmith,  "and 
that  is  that  Venus,  Cupid,  and  the  Graces  are  com- 
manded to  weep,  and  that  Bath  shall  never  find  such 
another."  These  effusions  are  forgotten  now;  and  so  would 
Beau  Nash  be  also  but  for  this  biography,  which,  no  doubt 
meant  merely  for  the  book-market  of  the  day,  lives  and  is 
of  permanent  value  by  reason  of  the  charm  of  its  style,  its 
pervading  humor,  and  the  vivacity  of  its  descriptions  of 
the  fashionable  follies  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Nullum 
fere  genus  scribendi  non  tetigit.  Nullum  quod  tetigit  non 
ornavit.  Who  but  Goldsmith  could  have  written  so  de- 
lightful a  book  about  such  a  poor  creature  as  Beau  Nash? 


THE  ARREST^  53 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

THE    ARREST. 

It  was  no  doubt  owing  to  Newbery  that  Goldsmith,  after 
his  return  to  London,  was  induced  to  abandon,  temporarily 
or  altogether,  his  apartments  in  Wine-Office  Court,  and 
take  lodgings  in  the  house  of  a  Mrs.  Fleming,  who  lived 
somewhere  or  other  in  Islington.  Newbery  had  rooms  in 
Canonbury  House,  a  curious  old  building  that  still  exists; 
and  it  may  have  occurred  to  the  publisher  that  Goldsmith, 
in  this  suburban  district,  would  not  only  be  nearer  him  for 
consultation  and  so  forth,  but  also  might  pay  more  atten- 
tion to  his  duties  than  when  he  was  among  the  temptations 
of  Fleet  Street.  Goldsmith  was  working  industriously  in 
the  service  of  Newbery  at  this  time  (1763-4);  in  fact,  so 
completely  was  the  book-seller  in  possession  of  the  hack, 
that  Goldsmith's  board  and  lodging  in  Mrs.  Fleniing's 
house,  arranged  for  at  £50  a  year,  was  paid  by  Newbery 
himself.  Writing  prefaces,  revising  new  editions,  con- 
tributing reviews — this  was  the  sort  of  work  he  undertook, 
with  more  or  less  content,  as  the  equivalent  of  the  modest 
sums  Mr.  Newbery  disbursed  for  him  or  handed  over  as 
pocket-money.  In  the  midst  of  all  this  drudgery  he  was 
now  secretly  engaged  on  work  that  aimed  at  something 
higher  than  mere  payment  of  bed  and  board.  The  smooth 
lines  of  the  Traveller  were  receiving  further  polish;  the 
gentle-natured  Vicar  was  writing  his  simple,  quaint,  ten- 
der story.  And  no  doubt  Goldsmith  was  spurred  to  try 
something  better  than  hack-work  by  the  associations  that 
ho  was  now  forming,  chiefly  under  the  wise  and  benevolent 
friendship  of  Johnson. 

Anxious  always  to  be  thought  well  of,  he  was  now  beg'n- 
ning  to  meet  people  whose  approval  was  worthy  of  being 
sought.  He  had  been  introduced  to  Reynolds.  He  had 
become  the  friend  of    Hogarth.     He  had  even  made  the 


64  LIFE  OF  Q0LB8MITE. 

acquaintance  of  Mr.  Boswell,  from  Scotland.  Moreover, 
he  had  been  invited  to  become  one  of  the  original  members 
of  the  famous  Club  of  which  so  much  has  been  written; 
his  fellow-members  being  Reynolds,  Johnson,  Burke,  Haw- 
kins, Beauclerk,  Bennet  Langton,  and  Dr.  Nugent.  It  is 
almost  certain  that  it  was  at  Johnson's  instigation  that  he 
had  been  admitted  into  this  choice  fellowship.  Long  before 
eitlier  the  Traveller  or  the  Vicar  had  been  heard  of,  John- 
son had  perceived  the  literary  genius  that  obscurely  burned 
in  the  uncouth  figure  of  this  Irishman,  and  was  anxious  to 
impress  on  others  Groldsmith's  claims  to  respect  and  con- 
sideration. In  the  minute  record  kept  by  Boswell  of  his 
first  evening  with  Johnson  at  the  Mitre  Tavern,  we  find 
Johnson  saying,  "  Dr.  Goldsmith  is  one  of  the  first  men 
we  now  have  as  an  author,  and  he  is  a  very  worthy  man 
too.  He  has  been  loose  in  his  principles,  but  he  is  coming 
right."  Johnson  took  walks  with  Goldsmith;  did  him  the 
honor  of  disputing  with  him  on  all  occasions;  bought  a  copy 
of  the  Life  of  Nash  when  it  appeared — an  unusual  compli- 
ment for  one  author  to  pay  another,  in  their  day  or  in  ours; 
allowed  him  to  call  on  Miss  Williams,  the  blind  old  lady  in 
Bolt  Court;  and  generally  was  his  friend,  counsellor,  and 
champion.  Accordingly,  when  Mr.  Boswell  enterta,ined 
the  great  Cham  to  supper  at  the  Mitre — a  sudden  quarrel 
with  his  landlord  having  made  it  impossible  for  him  to 
order  the  banquet  at  his  own  house — he  was  careful  to  have 
Dr.  Goldsmith  of  the  company.  His  guests  that  evening 
were  Johnson,  Goldsmith,  Davies  (the  actor  and  book- 
seller who  had  conferred  on  Boswell  the  invaluable  favor  of 
an  introduction  to  Johnson),  Mr.  Eccles,  and  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Ogilvie,  a  Scotch  poet  who  deserves  our  gratitude  because 
it  was  his  inopportune  patriotism  that  provoked,  on  this 
very  evening,  the  memorable  epigram  about  the  high-road 
leading  to  England.  "  Goldsmith,"  says  Boswell,  who  had 
not  got  over  his  envy  at  Goldsmith's  being  allowed  to  visit 
the  blind  old  pensioner  in  Bolt  Court,  "  as  usual,  endeav- 
ored with  too  much  eagerness  to  shine,  and  disputed  very 
warmly  with  Johnson  against  the  well-known  maxim  of  the 
British  constitution,  '  The  king  can  do  no  wrong. ' "  It  was  a 
dispute  not  so  much  about  facts  as  about  phraseology;  and, 
indeed,  there  seems  to  be  no  great  warmth  in  the  expres- 
sions used  on  either  side.     Goldsmith  affirmed  that  ''what 


THE  ARREST.  55 

was  morally  false  could  not  be  politically  true;"  and  that, 
in  short,  the  king  could  by  the  misuse  of  his  regal  power 
do  wrong.  Johnson  replied  that,  in  such  a  case,  the  imme- 
diate agents  of  the  king  were  the  persons  to  be  tried  and 
punished  for  the  offence.  "  The  king,  though  he  sliould 
command,  cannot  force  a  judge  to  condemn  a  man  unjustly; 
therefore  it  is  the  judge  whom  we  prosecute  and  punish." 
But  when  he  stated  that  the  king  "is  above  everytliing, 
and  there  is  no  power  by  which  he  can  be  tried,"  he  was 
surely  forgetting  an  important  chapter  in  English  history. 
*'  What  did  Cromwell  do  for  his  country?"  he  himself 
asked,  during  his  subsequent  visit  to  Scotland,  of  old  Auch- 
inleck,  Boswell's  father.  *'God,  Doctor,"  replied  the  vile 
Whig,  "he  garred  hings  ken  they  had  a  lith  in  their 
necks." 

For  some  time  after  this  evening  Goldsmith  drops  out 
of  Boswell's  famous  memoir;  perhaps  the  compiler  was  not 
anxious  to  give  him  too  much  prominence.  They  had  not 
liked  each  other  from  the  outset.  Boswell,  vexed  by  the 
greater  intimacy  of  Goldsmith  with  Johnson,  called  him  a 
blunderer,  a  feather-brained  person,  and  described  his  ap- 
pearance in  no  flattering  terms.  Goldsmith,  on  the  other 
hand,  on  being  asked  who  was  this  Scotch  cur  that  fol- 
lowed Johnson's  heels,  answered,  "He  is  not  a  cur:  you 
are  too  severe — he  is  only  a  bur.  Tom  Davies  flung  him 
at  Johnson  in  sport,  and  he  has  the  faculty  of  sticking." 
Boswell  would  probably  have  been  more  tolerant  of  Gold- 
smith as  a  rival,  if  he  could  have  known  that  on  a  future 
day  he  was  to  have  Johnson  all  to  himself — to  carry  him  to 
remote  wilds  and  exhibit  him  as  a  portentious  literary  phe- 
nomenon to  Highland  lairds.  It  is  true  that  Johnson,  at 
an  early  period  of  his  acquaintance  with  Boswell,  did  talk 
vaguely  about  a  trip  to  the  Hebrides;  but  the  young  Scotch 
idolater  thought  it  was  all  too  good  to  be  true.  "The  men- 
tion of  Sir  James  Macdonald,"  says  Boswell,  "led  us  to 
talk  of  the  Western  Islands  of  Scotland,  to  visit  which  he 
expressed  a  wish  that  then  appeared  to  me  a  very  romantic 
fancy,  which  I  little  thought  would  be  afterward  realized. 
He  told  me  that  his  father  had  put  Martin's  account  of 
those  islands  into  his  hands  when  he  was  very  young,  and 
that  he  was  highly  pleased  with  it;  that  he  was  particularly 
struck  with  the  St.  Kilda  man's  notion   that  the  High 


66  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Church  of  Glasgow  had  been  hollowed  out  of  a  rock;  a 
circumstance  to  which  old  Mr.  Johnson  had  directed  his 
attention/'  Unfortunately  Goldsmith  not  only  disappears 
from  the  pages  of  Bos  well's  biography  at  this  time,  but 
also  in  great  measure  from  the  ken  of  his  companions.  He 
was  deeply  in  debt;  no  doubt  the  fine  clothes  he  had  been 
ordering  from  Mr.  Filby  in  order  that  he  might  "siiine" 
among  those  notable  persons,  had  something  to  do  with  it; 
he  had  tried  the  patience  of  the  book-sellers;  and  he  had 
been  devoting  a  good  deal  of  time  to  work  not  intended  to 
elicit  immediate  payment.  The  most  patient  endeavors  to 
trace  out  his  changes  of  lodgings,  and  the  fugitive  writings 
that  kept  him  in  daily  bread,  have  not  been  very  successful. 
It  is  to  be  presumed  that  Goldsmith  had  occasionally  to  go 
into  hiding  to  escape  from  his  creditors,  and  so  was  missed 
from  his  familiar  haunts.  We  only  reach  daylight  again, 
to  find  Goldsmith  being  under  threat  of  arrest  from  his 
landlady;  and  for  the  particulars  of  this  famous  affair  it  is 
necessary  to  return  to  Boswell. 

Boswell  was  not  in  London  at  that  time;  but  his  account 
was  taken  down  subsequently  from  Johnson's  narration; 
and  his  accuracy  in  other  matters,  his  extraordinary  mem- 
ory, and  scrupulous  care,  leave  no  doubt  in  the  mind  that 
his  version  of  the  story  is  to  be  preferred  to  those  of  Mrs. 
Piozzi  and  Sir  John  Hawkins.  We  may  take  it  that  these 
are  Johnson's  own  words:  "  I  received  one  morning  a  mes- 
sage from  poor  Goldsmith  that  he  was  in  great  distress,  and, 
as  it  was  not  in  his  power  to  come  to  me,  begging  that  I 
would  come  to  him  as  soon  as  possible.  I  sent  him  a 
guinea,  and  promised  to  come  to  him  directly.  I  accord- 
ingly went  to  him  as  soon  as  I  was  dressed,  and  found  that 
his  landlady  had  arrested  him  for  his  rent,  at  which  he  was 
in  a  violent  passion.  I  perceived  that  he  had  already 
changed  my  guinea,  and  had  got  a  bottle  of  Maderia  and  a 
glass  before  him.  I  put  the  cork  into  the  bottle,  desired 
he  would  be  calm,  and  began  to  talk  to  him  of  the  means 
by  which  he  might  be  extricated.  He  then  told  me  that 
he  had  a  novel  ready  for  the  press,  which  he  produced  to 
me.  I  looked  into  it,  and  saw  its  merit;  told  the  landlady 
I  should  soon  return;  and,  having  gone  to  a  book-seller, 
sold  it  for  £60.  I  brought  Goldsmith  the  money,  and  he 
discharged  his  rent,  not  without  rating  his  landlady  in  a 
high  tone  for  having  used  him  so  ill." 


THE  ARREST.  57 

We  do  not  know  who  this  landlady  was — it  cannot  now 
be  made  out  whether  the  incident  occurred  at  Islington, 
or  in  the  rooms  that  Goldsmith  partially  occupied  in  the 
Temple;  but  even  if  Mrs.  Fleming  be  the  landlady  in 
question,  she  was  deserving  neither  of  Goldsmith's  rating 
nor  of  the  reprimands  that  have  been  bestowed  upon  her 
by  later  writers.  Mrs.  Fleming  had  been  exceedingly 
kind  to  Goldsmith.  Again  and  again  in  her  bills  we  find 
items  significantly  marked  £0  Os,  Od.  And  if  her  ac- 
counts with  her  lodger  did  get  hopelessly  into  arrear; 
and  if  she  was  annoyed  by  seeing  him  go  out  in  fine 
clothes  to  sup  at  the  Mitre;  and  if,  at  length,  her  patience 
gave  way,  and  she  determined  to  have  her  rights  in  one 
way  or  another,  she  was  no  worse  than  landladies — who 
are  only  human  beings,  and  not  divinely  appointed 
protectresses  of  genius — ordinarily  are.  Mrs.  Piozzi  says 
that  when  Johnson  came  back  with  the  money.  Goldsmith 
"  called  the  woman  of  the  house  directly  to  partake  of 
punch,  and  pass  their  time  in  merriment."  This  would  be 
a  dramatic  touch;  but,  after  Johnson's  quietly  corking 
the  botde  of  Maderia,  it  is  more  likely  that  no  such  thing 
occurred;  especially  as  Boswell  quotes' the  statement  as  an 
"extreme  inaccuracy." 

The  novel  which  Johnson  had  taken  away  and  sold  to 
Francis  Newbery,  a  nephew  of  the  elder  book-seller,  was, 
as  every  o.ie  knows,  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield.  That  Gold- 
smith, amid  all  his  pecuniary  distresses,  should  have  re- 
tained this  piece  in  his  desk,  instead  of  pawning  or  promis- 
ing it  to  one  of  his  book-selling  patriots,  points  to  but  one 
concliision--thit  he  was  building  high  hopes  on  it,  and 
was  determined  to  make  it  as  good  as  lay  within  his  power. 
Goldsmith  put  an  anxious  finish  into  all  his  better  work; 
perhaps  that  is  the  secret  of  the  graceful  ease  that  is  now 
apparent  in  every  line.  Any  young  writer  who  may  imag- 
ine that  the  power  of  clear  and  concise  literary  expression 
comes  by  nature,  cannot  do  better  than  study,  in  Mr.  Cun- 
ningham's big  collection  of  Goldsmith's  writings,  the  con- 
tinual and  minute  alterations  which  the  author  considered 
necessary  even  after  the  first  edition — sometimes  when  the 
second  and  tiiird  editions — had  been  published.  Many  of 
these,  especially  in  the  poetical  works,  were  merely  im- 


58  LIFE  OF  O0LD8MITH. 

provenients  in  sound  as  suggested  by  a  singularly  sensitive 
ear,  as  when  he  altered  the  line 

*'  Amidst  the  ruin,  heedless  of  the  dead," 

which  had  appeared  in  the  first  three  editions  of  the 
Traveller,  into 

"  There  in  the  ruin,  heedless  of  the  dead," 

which  appeared  in  the  fourth.  But  the  majority  of  the 
omissions  and  corrections  were  prompted  by  a  careful  taste, 
that  abhorred  every  thing  redundant  or  slovenly.  It  has 
been  suggested  that  when  Johnson  carried  off  the  Vicar  of 
Wakefield  to  Francis  Newbery,  the  manuscript  was  not 
quite  finished,  but  had  to  be  completed  afterward.  There 
was  at  least  plenty  of  time  for  that.  Newbery  docs  not 
appear  to  have  imagined  that  he  had  obtained  a  prize  in 
ilie  lottery  of  literature.  He  paid  the  £60  for  it — clearly 
on  the  assurance  of  the  great  father  of  learning  of  the  day, 
that  there  was  merit  in  the  little  story — somewhere  about 
the  end  of  1764;  but  the  tale  was  not  issued  to  the  public 
until  March,  1766.  "  And,  sir,  remarked  Johnson  to 
Boswell,  with  regard  to  the  sixty  pounds,  "  a  sufficient 
price,  too,  when  it  was  sold;  for  then  the  fame  of  Gi-old- 
smith  had  not  been  elevated,  as  it  afterward  was,  by  his 
Traveller;  and  the  book-seller  had  such  faint  hopes  of 
profit  by  his  bargain,  that  he  kept  the  manuscript  by  him 
a  long  time,  and  did  not  publish  it  till  after  the  Traveller 
had  appeared.  Then,  to  be  sure,  it  was  accidentally  worth 
more  money/' 


TEE  TEA  VELLER,  59 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE    TRAVELLER. 

This  poem  of  the  Traveller,  the  fruit  of  much  secret 
labor  and  the  consummation  of  the  liopes  of  many  years, 
was  lying  completed  in  Goldsmith's  desk  when  the  inci- 
dent of  the  arrest  occurred;  and  the  elder  Newbery  had 
undertaken  to  publish  it.  Then,  as  at  other  times,  John- 
son lent  his  wayward  child  of  genius  a  friendly  hand.  He 
read  over  the  proof-sheets  for  Goldsmith:  was  so  kind  as 
to  put  in  a  line  here  or  there  where  he  thought  fit;  and  pre- 
pared a  notice  of  the  poem  for  the  Critical  Review.  The 
time  for  the  appearance  of  this  new  claimant  for  poetical 
honors  was  propitious.  *'  There  was  perhaps  no  point  in 
the  century,"  says  Professor  Masson,  "  when  the  British 
Muse,  such  as  she  had  come  to  be,  was  doing  less,  or  had 
so  nearly  ceased  to  do  anything,  or  to  have  any  good 
opinion  of  herself,  as  precisely  about  the  year  1764. 
Young  was  dying;  Gray  was  recluse  and  indolent;  John- 
son had  long  given  over  his  metrical  experimentations  on 
any  except  the  most  inconsiderable  scale;  Akenside,  Arm- 
strong, Smollett,  and  others  less  known,  had  pretty  well  re- 
vealed the  amount  of  their  worth  in  poetry;  and  Churchill, 
after  his  ferocious  blaze  of  what  was  really  rage  and  declama- 
tion in  meter,  though  conventionally  it  was  called  poetry,  was 
prematurely  defunct.  Into  this  lull  came  Goldsmith's  short 
but  carefully  finished  poem."  "There  has  not  been  so 
fine  a  poem  since  Pope's  time,"  remarked  Johnson  to  Bos- 
well,  on  the  very  first  evening  after  the  return  of  young 
Auchinleck  to  London.  It  would  have  been  no  matter  for 
surprise  had  Goldsmith  dedicated  this  first  work  that  he 
published  under  his  own  name  to  Johnson,  who  had  for  so 
long  been  his  constant  friend  and  adviser;  and  such  a 
dedication  would  have  carried  weight  in  certain  quarters. 
But  there  was  a  finer   touch  in  Goldsmith's   thought  of 


60  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Inscribing  the  book  to  his  brother  Henry;  and  no  doubt 
the  pubhc  were  surprised  and  pleased  to  find  a  poor  devil 
of  an  author  dedicating  a  work  to  an  Irish  parson  with 
£40  a  year,  from  whom  he  could  not  well  expect  any 
return.  It  will  be  remembered  that  it  was  to  this  brother 
Henry  that  Goldsmith,  ten  years  before,  had  sent  the  first 
sketch  of  the  poem;  and  now  the  wanderer, 

"  Remote,  unfriended,  melancholy,  slow," 
declares  how  his  heart  untravailed 

"  Still  to  my  brother  turns,  with  ceaseless  pain. 
And  drags  at  each  remove  a  lengthening  chain." 

The  very  first  line  of  the  poem  strikes  a  key-note — there 
is  in  it  a, pathetic  thrill  of  distance,  and  regret,  and  long- 
ing; and  it  has  the  soft  musical  sound  that  pervades  the 
whole  composition.  It  is  exceedingly  interesting  to  note, 
as  has  already  been  mentioned,  how  Goldsmith  altered  and 
altered  these  lines  until  he  had  got  them  full  of  gentle 
vowel  sounds.  Where,  indeed,  in  the  Euglish  language 
could  one  find  more  graceful  melody  than  this? — 

"The  naked  negro,  panting  at  the  line. 
Boasts  of  his  golden  sands  and  palmy  wine. 
Basks  in  the  glare,  or  stems  the  tepid  wave, 
And  thanks  his  gods  for  all  the  good  they  gave." 

It  has  been  observed  also  that  Goldsmith  was  the  first  to 
introduce  into  English  poetry  sonorous  American — or 
rather  Indian — names,  as  when  he  writes  in  this  poem 

"Where  wild  Oswego  spreads  her  swamps  around. 
And  Niagara  stuns  with  thundering  sound; " 

and  if  it  be  charged  against  him  that  he  ought  to  have 
known  the  proper  accentuation  of  Niagara,  it  may  be 
mentioned  as  a  set-off  that  Sir  Walter  Scott,  in  dealing 
with  his  own  country,  mis-accentuated  **Glenal4dale,"  to 
say  nothing  of  his  having  made  of  Koseneath  an  island. 
Another  characteristic  of  ihe'Traveller  is  the  extraordinary 
choiceness  and  conciseness  of  the  diction,  which,  instead  of 
suggesting  pedantry  or  affectation,  betrays,  on  the  contrary, 
nothing  but  a  delightful  ease  and  grace. 

The  English  people  are  very  fond  of  good  English;  and 
thus  it  is  that  couplets  from  the  Traveller  and  the  Deserted 


THE  TRA  VELLER.  61 

Village  have  come  into  the  common  stock  of  our  language, 
and  that  sometimes  not  so  much  on  account  of  the  ideas 
they  convey,  as  through  their  singular  precision  of  epithet 
and  musical  sound.  It  is  enough  to  make  the  angels  weep 
to  find  such  a  couplet  as  this, 

"  Cheerful  at  morn,  he  wakes  from  short  repose, 
Breasts  the  keen  air,  and  carols  as  he  goes," 

murdered  in  several  editions  of  Groldsmith's  works  by  the 
substitution  of  the  commonplace  "  breathes  ''  for  "  breasts" 
— and  that  after  Johnson  had  drawn  particular  attention 
to  the  line  by  quoting  it  in  his  Dictionary.  Perhaps, 
indeed,  it  may  be  admitted  that  the  literary  charm  of  the 
Traveller  is  more  apparent  than  the  value  of  any  doctrine, 
however  profound  or  ingenious,  which  the  poem  was  sup- 
posed to  inculcate.  We  forget  all  about  the  "particular 
principle  of  happiness  "  possessed  by  each  European  state, 
in  listening  to  the  melody  of  the  singer,  and  in  watching 
the  successive  and  delightful  pictures  that  he  calls  up 
before  the  imagination. 

"As  in  those  domes  where  Caesars  once  bore  sway, 
Defaced  by  time,  and  tottering  in  decay, 
There  in  the  ruin,  heedless  of  the  dead. 
The  shelter-seeking  peasant  builds  his  shed; 
And,  wondering  man  could  want  the  larger  pile, 
Exults,  and  owns  his  cottage  with  a  smile." 

Then  notice  the  blaze  of  patriotic  idealism  that  bursts 
forth  when  he  comes  to  talk  of  England,  What  sort  of 
England  had  he  been  familiar  with  Avhen  he  was  consorting 
with  the  meanest  wretches — the  poverty-stricken,  the  sick 
and  squalid — in  those  Fleet-street  dens?  But  it  is  an 
England  of  bright  streams  and  spacious  lawns  of  which  he 
writes;  and  as  for  the  people  who  inhabit  the  favored 
land — 

"Stern  o'er  each  bosom  reason  holds  her  state, 
With  daring  aims  irregularly  great; 
Pride  in  their  port,  defiance  in  their  eye, 
I  see  the  lords  of  human  kind  pass  by. " 

"  Whenever  I  write  anything,"  Goldsmith  had  said, 
with  a  humorous  exaggeration  which  Boswell,  as  usual, 
takes  au  serieux,  "  the  public  make  a  point  to  know 
nothing  about  it."     But  we  have  Johnson's  testimony  to 


62  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

the  fact  that  the  Traveller  *'  brought  him  into  high  repu- 
tation." No  wonder.  When  the  great  Cham  deckires  it 
to  be  the  finest  poem  published  since  the  time  of  Pope,  we 
are  irresistibly  forced  to  think  of  the  Essay  on  Man. 
What  a  contrast  there  is  between  that  tedious  and  stilted 
effort  and  this  clear  burst  of  bird-song!  The  Traveller, 
however,  did  not  immediately  become  popular.  It  was 
largely  talked  about,  naturally,  among  Goldsmith's  friends; 
and  Johnson  would  scarcely  suffer  any  criticism  of  it.  At 
a  dinner  given  long  afterward  at  Sir  Joshua  Reynold's,  and 
fully  reported  by  the  invaluable  Boswell,  Reynolds  re- 
marked, "  I  was  glad  to  hear  Charles  Fox  say  that  it  was 
one  of  the  finest  poems  in  the  English  language."  "  Why 
were  you  glad?"  said  Langton.  "You  surely  had  no 
doubt  of  this  before?"  Hereupon  Johnson  struck  in: 
**  No;  the  merit  of  the  Traveller  is  so  well  established  that 
Mr.  Fox^s  praise  cannot  augment  it  nor  his  censure  di- 
minish it."  And  he  went  on  to  say— Goldsmith  having 
died  and  got  beyond  the  reach  of  all  critics  and  creditors 
some  three  or  four  years  before  this  time — "  Goldsmith 
was  a  man  who,  whatever  he  wrote,  did  it  better  than  any 
other  man  could  do.  He  deserved  a  place  in  Westminster 
Abbey;  and  every  year  he  lived  would  have  de^ei'ved  it 
better." 

Presently  people  began  to  talk  about  the  new  poem. 
A  second  edition  was  issued;  a  third;  a  fourth.  It  is 
not  probable  that  Goldsmith  gained  any  pecuniary  benefit 
from  the  growing  popularity  of  the  little  book;  but  he 
had  "  struck  for  honest  fame,"  and  that  was  now 
coming  to  him.  He  even  made  some  slight  acquaintance 
with  "  the  great;"  and  here  occurs  an  incident  which  is 
one  of  many  that  account  for  the  love  that  the  English 
people  have  for  Goldsmith.  It  appears  that  Hawkins, 
calling  one  day  on  the  Earl  of  Northumberland,  found 
the  author  of  the  Traveller  waiting  in  the  outer  room,  in 
response  to  an  invitation.  Hawkins,  having  finished  his 
own  business,  retired,  but  lingered  about  until  the  inter- 
view between  Goldsmith  and  his  lordship  was  over,  having 
some  curiosity  about  the  result.  Here  follows  Goldsmith's 
report  to  Hawkins:  "His  lordship  told  me  he  had  read  my 
poem,  and  was  much  delighted  with  it;  that  he  was  going 
to  be  Lord -lieutenant  of  Ireland;  and  that,  hearing  that  I 


TEE  TRAVELLER.  63 

was  a  native  of  that  country,  he  should  be  glad  to  do  me 
any  kindness."  "  What  did  you  answer?"  says  Hawkins, 
no  doubt  expecting  to  hear  of  some  application  for  pension 
or  post.  "Why,"  said  Goldsmith,"!  could  say  nothing 
but  that  1  nao  d  brother  there,  a  clergyman,  that  stood  in 
need  of  help  ^' — and  then  he  explained  to  Hawkins  that  he 
looked  to  the  oook-sellers  for  support,  and  was  not  inclined 
to  place  dependence  o'->  ^-hc  promises  of  great  men.  "  Thus 
did  this  idiot  in  tiic  aJiairs  of  the  world,"  adds  Hawkins, 
with  a  fatuity  that  is  quite  remarkable  in  its  way,  "  trifle 
with  hig  .ortttisHt.,  -lau-  put  back  the  hand  that  was  held  out 
to  assist  him!  Other  oilers  of  a  like  kind  he  either  rejected 
or  failed  to  ^wr^ifove,  contenting  himself  with  the  patronage 
of  one  nobieman,  whose  mansion  afforded  him  the  delights 
of  a  splendid  taole  and  a  retreat  for  a  few  days  from  the 
metropolis."  It  is  a  great  pity  we  have  not  a  description 
from  the  same  pen  of  Johnson's  insolent  ingratitude  m 
flinging  the  pair  of  boots  dowa-stairs. 


64  LIFE  OF  Q0LD8MITB. 


CHAPTER  X. 

MISCELLANEOUS  WKITiNG. 

But  one  pecuniary  result  of  thi?  growing  fame  was  a 

joint  offer  on  the  part  of  Griffin  and  Newbery  of  £20  for  a 
selection  from  his  printed  essays;  and  this  selection  was 
forthwith  made  and  published,  with  a  preface  written  for 
the  occasion.  Here  at  once  we  can  see  that  Goldsmith 
takes  firmer  ground.  There  is  an  air  of  confidence — of 
gayety,  even — in  his  address  to  the  public;  although,  as 
usual,  accompanied  by  a  whimsical  mock-modesty  that  is 
extremely  odd  and  effective.  "  Whatever  right  I  have  to 
complain  of  the  public,"  he  says,  "  they  can,  as  yet,  have 
no  just  reason  to  complain  of  me.  If  I  have  written  dull 
Essays,  they  have  hitherto  treated  them  as  dull  Essays. 
Thus  far  we  are  at  least  upon  par,  and  until  they  think  fit 
to  make  me  their  humble  debtor  by  praise,  I  am  resolved 
not  to  lose  a  single  inch  of  my  self-importance.  Instead, 
therefore,  of  attempting  to  establish  a  credit  among  them, 
it  will  perhaps  be  wiser  to  apply  to  some  more  distant  corres- 
pondent; and  as  my  drafts  are  in  some  danger  of  being 
protested  at  home,  it  may  not  be  imprudent,  upon  this 
occasion,  to  draw  my  bills  upon  Posterity. 

"Mr.  Posterity: — 

"Sir:  Nine  hundred  and  ninety-nine  years  after  sight 
hereof  pay  the  bearer,  or  order,  a  thousand  pounds'  worth 
of  praise,  free  from  all  deductions  whatsoever,  it  being  a 
commodity  that  will  then  be  very  serviceable  to  him,  and 
place  it  to  the  account  of,  etc." 

The  bill  is  not  yet  due;  but  there  can  in  the  meantime 
be  no  harm  in  discounting  it  so  far  as  to  say  that  these 
Essays  deserve  very  decided  praise.  They  deal  with  all 
manner  of  topics,  matters  of  fact,  matters  of  imagination. 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITmO.  65' 

hnmoions  descriptions,  learned  criticisms;  and  then,  when- 
ever the  entertainer  thinks  he  is  becoming  dull,  he  sud- 
denly tells  a  quaint  little  story  and  walks  off  amid  the 
laughter  he  knows  he  has  produced.  It  is  not  a  very  am- 
bitious or  sonorous  sort  of  literature;  but  it  was  admirably 
fitted  for  i'  s  aim — the  passing  of  the  immediate  hour  in  an 
agreeable  and  fairly  intellectual  wa3^  One  can  often  see, 
no  doubt,  that  these  Essays  are  occasionally  written  in  a 
more  or  less  perfunctory  fashion,  the  writer  not  beiug 
moved  by  much  enthusiasm  in  his  subject;  but  even  then  a 
quaint  literary  grace  seldom  fails  to  atone,  as  when,  writing 
about  the  English  clergy,  and  complaining  that  they  do  not 
sufficiently  in  their  addresses  stoop  to  mean  capacities,  he 
says:  "  Whatever  may  become  of  the  higher  orders  of  man- 
kind, who  are  generally  possessed  of  collateral  motives  to 
virtue,  the  vulgar  should  be  particularly  regarded,  whose 
behavior  in  civil  life  is  totally  hinged  upon  their  hopes  and 
fears.  Those  who  constitute  the  basis  of  the  great  fabric  of 
society  should  be  particularly  regarded;  for  in  policy,  as  in 
architecture,  ruin  •  is  most  fatal  when  it  begins  from  the 
bottom.^'  There  was  indeed,  throughout  Goldsmith's  mis- 
cellaneous writing  much  more  common-sense  than  might 
have  been  expected  from  a  writer  who  was  sujiposed  to  have 
none. 

As  regards  his  chance  criticisms  on  dramatic  and  poet- 
ical literature,  these  are  generally  found  to  be  incisive  and 
just;  while  sometimes  they  exhibit  a  wholesome  disregard 
of  mere  tradition  and  authority.  '^  Milton's  translation  of 
Horace's  Ode  to  Pyrrha,"  he  says,  for  example,  "  is  uni- 
versally known  and  generally  admired,  in  our  opinion  much 
above  its  merit."  If  the  present  writer  might  for  a  mo- 
ment venture  into  such  an  arena,  he  would  express  the 
honest  belief  that  that  translation  is  the  very  worst  trans- 
lation that  was  ever  made  of  anything.  But  there  is  the 
happy  rendering  of  simplex  munditiis,  which  counts  for 
much. 

By  this  time  Goldsmith  had  also  written  his  charming 
ballad  of  Edtoin  and  Angelina,  which  was  privately 
"  printed  for  the  amusement  of  the  Countess  of  Northum- 
berland," and  which  afterward  appeared  in  the  Vicar  of 
Wakefield.  It  seems  clear  enough  that  this  quaint  and  pa- 
thetic piece  was  suggested  by  an  old  ballad  beginning. 


66  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

"  Gentle  herdsman,  tell  to  me, 
Of  curtesy  I  thee  pray, 
Unto  the  towne  of  Walsingham 
Which  is  the  right  and  ready  way," 

which  Percy  had  shown  to  Goldsmith,  and  which,  patched 
up,  subsequently  appeared  in  the  Reliques.  But  Goldsmith's 
ballad  is  original  enough  to  put  aside  all  the  discussion 
about  plagiarism  which  was  afterward  started.  In  the  old 
fragment  the  weeping  pilgrim  receives  directions  from  the 
herdsman,  and  goes  on  her  way,  and  we  hear  of  her  no 
more;  in  Bdwin  and  Angelifia  the  forlorn  and  despairing 
maiden  suddenly  finds  herself  confronted  by  the  long-lost 
lover  whom  she  had  so  cruelly  used.  This  is  the  dramatic 
touch  that  reveals  the  hand  of  the  artist.  And  here  again 
it  is  curious  to  note  the  care  with  which  Goldsmith  repeat- 
edly revised  his  writings.  The  ballad  originally  ended  with 
these  two  stanzas: 

"Here  amidst  sylvan  bowers  we'll  rove. 
From  lawn  to  woodland  stray; 
Blest  as  the  songsters  of  the  grove. 
And  innocent  as  they. 

"  To  all  that  want,  and  all  that  wail. 
Our  pity  shall  be  given, 
And  when  this  life  of  love  shall  fail, 
We'll  love  again  in  heaven." 

But  subsequently  it  must  have  occurred  to  the  author 
that,  the  dramatic  disclosure  once  made,  and  the  lovers 
restored  to  each  other,  any  lingering  over  the  scene  only 
weakened  the  force  of  the  climax;  hence  these  stanzas 
were  judiciously  excised.  It  may  be  doubted,  however, 
whether  the  original  version  of  the  last  couplet, 

"  And  the  last  sigh  that  rends  the  heart 
Shall  break  thy  Edwin's  too," 

was  improved  by  being  altered  into 

"  The  sigh  that  rends  thy  constant  heart 
Shall  break  thy  Edwin's  too." 

Meanwhile  Goldsmith  had  resorted  to  hack-work  again; 
nothing  being  expected  from  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  now 
lying  in  Newbery's  shop,  for  that  had  been  paid  for,  and 
his  expenses  were  increasing,  as  became  his  greater  station. 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRTTING.  67 

In  the  interval  between  the  publication  of  the  Traveller  and 
of  the  Vicar,  he  moved  into  better  chambers  in  Garden 
Court;  he  hired  a  man-servant,  he  blossomed  out  into  very 
fine  clothes.  Indeed,  so  effective  did  his  first  suit  seem  to 
be — the  purple  silk  small-clothes,  the  scarlet  roquelaure, 
the  wig,  sword,  and  gold-headed  cane — that,  as  Mr.  For- 
ster  says,  he  "  amazed  his  friends  with  no  less  than  three 
similar  suits,  not  less  expensive,  in  the  next  six  months." 
Part  of  this  display  was  no  doubt  owing  to  a  suggestion 
from  Reynolds  that  Goldsmith,  having  a  medical  degree, 
might  just  as  well  add  the  practice  of  a  physician  to  his 
literary  work,  to  magnify  his  social  position.  Goldsmith, 
always  willing  to  please  his  friends,  acceded;  but  his  prac- 
tice does  not  appear  to  have  been  either  extensive  or  long- 
continued.  It  is  said  that  he  drew  out  a  prescription  for  a 
certain  Mrs.  Sidebotham  which  so  appalled  the  apothecary 
that  he  refused  to  make  it  up;  and  that,  a  the  lady  sided 
with  the  apothecary,  he  threw  up  the  case  and  his  profes- 
sion at  the  same  time.  If  it  was  money  Goldsmith  wanted, 
he  was  not  likely  to  get  it  in  that  way;  he  had  neither  the 
appearance  nor  the  manner  fitted  to  humor  the  sick  and 
transform  healthy  people  into  valetudinarians.  If  it  was 
the  esteem  of  his  friends  and  popularity  outside  that 
circle,  he  was  soon  to  acquire  enough  of  both.  On  the 
27th  of  March,  1766,  fifteen  months  after  the  appearance  of 
the  Iraveller,  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield  was  published. 


68  J^Ii'^  OF  GOLDSMITH. 


CHAPTER  XL 

THE   VICAK   OF   WAKEFIELD. 

The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  considered  structurally,  fol- 
lows the  lines  of  the  Book  of  Job.  You  take  a  good  man, 
overwhelm  him  with  successive  misfortunes,  show  the  pure 
flame  of  his  soul  burning  in  the  midst  of  the  darkness,  and 
then,  as  the  reward  of  his  patience  and  fortitude  and  sub- 
mission, restore  him  gradually  to  happiness,  with  even 
larger  flocks  and  herds  than  before.  The  machinery  by 
which  all  this  is  brought  about  is,  in  the  Vicar  of  Wake- 
field, the  weak  part  of  the  story.  The  plot  is  full  of  wild 
improbabilities;  in  fact,  the  expedients  by  which  all  the 
members  of  the  family  are  brought  together  and  made 
happy  at  the  same  time  are  nothing  short  of  desperate.  It 
is  quite  clear,  too,  that  the  author  does  not  know  what  to 
make  of  the  episode  of  Olivia  and  her  husband;  they  are 
allowed  to  drop  through;  we  leave  him  playing  the  French 
horn  at  a  relation's  house;  while  she,  in  her  father's  home, 
is  supposed  to  be  unnoticed,  so  much  are  they  all  taken  up 
■with  the  rejoicings  over  the  double  wedding.  It  is  very 
probable  that  when  Goldsmith  began  the  story  he  had  no 
very  definite  plot  concocted;  and  that  it  was  only  when  the 
much-persecuted  Vicar  had  to  be  restored  to  happiness, 
that  he  found  the  entanglements  surrounding  him,  and 
had  to  make  frantic  efforts  to  break  through  them.  But, 
be  that  as  it  may,  it  is  not  for  the  plot  that  people  now 
read  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield;  it  is  not  the  intricacies  of  the 
story  that  have  made  it  the  delight  of  the  world.  Surely 
human  nature  must  be  very  much  the  same  when  this  sim- 
ple description  of  a  quiet  English  home  went  straight  to 
the  heart  of  nations  in  both  hemispheres. 

And  the  wonder  is  that  Goldsmith  of  all  men  should 
have  produced  such  a  perfect  picture  of  domestic  life. 
What  had  his  own  life  been  but  a  moving  about  between 


THE  VICAR  OF  WAKEFIELD,  69 

garret  and  tavern,  between  bachelor's  lodgings  and  clubs? 
Where  had  he  seen — unless,  indeed,  he  looked  back  through 
the  mist  of  years  to  the  scenes  of  his  childhood — all  this 
gentle  government,  and  wise  blindness;  all  this  affection, 
and  consideration,  and  respect?  There  is  as  much  human 
nature  in  the  character  of  the  Vicar  alone  as  would  have 
furnished  any  fifty  of  the  novels  of  that  day,  or  of  this. 
Who  has  not  been  charmed  by  his  sly  and  quaint  humor, 
by  his  moral  dignity  and  simple  vanities,  even  by  the  little 
secrets  he  reveals  to  us  of  his  paternal  rule.  *"Ay,'  re- 
turned I,  not  knowing  well  what  to  think  of  the  matter, 
*  heaven  grant  that  they  may  be  both  the  better  for  it  this 
day  three  months  I'  This  was  one  of  those  observations  I 
usually  made  to  impress  my  wife  with  an  opinion  of  my 
sagacity;  for  if  the  girls  succeeded,  then  it  was  a  pious  wish 
fulfilled;  but  if  anything  unfortunate  ensued,  then  it  might 
be  looked  on  as  a  prophecy."  We  know  how  Miss  Olivia 
was  answered,  when,  at  her  mother's  promj)ting,  she  set  up 
for  being  well  skilled  in  controversy: 

"  '  Why,  my  dear,  what  controversy  can  she  have  read?' 
cried  I.  'It  does  not  occur  to  me  that  I  ever  put 
such  books  into  her  hands:  you  certainly  overrate  her 
merit.' — ^Indeed,  papa,' replied  Olivia,  'she  does  not;  I 
have  read  a  great  deal  of  controversy.  I  have  read  the 
disputes  between  Thwackum  and  Square;  the  controversy 
between  Kobinson  Crusoe  and  Friday,  the  savage;  and  I  am 
employed  in  reading  the  controversy  in  Religious  Court- 
ship.'— 'Very  well,'  cried  I,  'that's  a  good  girl;  1  find  you 
are  perfectly  qualified  for  making  converts,  and  so  go  help 
your  mother  to  make  the  gooseberry  pie.'  " 

It  is  with  a  great  gentleness  that  the  good  man  reminds 
his  wife  and  daughters  that,  after  their  sudden  loss  of 
fortune,  it  does  not  become  them  to  wear  much  finery. 
"  The  first  Sunday,  in  particular,  their  behavior  served  to 
mortify  me.  I  had  desired  my  girls  the  preceding  night 
to  be  dressed  early  the  next  day;  for  I  always  loved  to  be 
at  church  a  good  while  before  the  rest  of  the  congregation. 
They  punctually  obeyed  my  directions;  but  when  we 
were  to  assemble  in  the  morning  at  breakfast,  down  came 
my  wife  and  daughters,  dressed  out  in  all  their  former 
splendor;  their  hair  plastered  up  with  pomatum,  their 
faces  patched  to  taste,  their  trains  bundled  up  in  a  heap 


70  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

behind,  and  rustling  at  every  motion.  I  could  not  help 
Bmiling  at  their  vanity,  particularly  that  of  my  wife,  from 
whom  I  expected  more  discretion.  In  this  exigence,  there- 
fore, my  only  resource  was  to  order  my  son,  with  an  im- 
portant air,  to  call  our  coach.  The  girls  were  amazed  at 
the  command;  but  I  repeated  it  with  more  solemnity  than 
before.  *  Surely,  my  dear,  you  jest,'  cried  my  wife;  '  we 
can  walk  it  perfectly  well;  we  want  no  coach  to  carry  us 
now.' — '  You  mistake,  child,'  returned  I,  '  we  do  want  a 
coach;  for  if  we  walk  to  church  in  this  trim,  the  very 
children  in  the  parish  will  hoot  after  us.' — 'Indeed,' re- 
plied my  wife,  '  I  always  imagined  that  my  Charles  was 
fond  of  seeing  his  children  neat  and  handsome  about  him.' 
— '  You  may  be  as  neat  as  you  please,'  interrupted  I,  *  and 
I  shall  love  you  the  better  for  it;  but  all  this  is  not  neat- 
ness, but  frippery.  These  rufflings,  and  pin  kings,  and 
patchings  will  only  make  us  hated  by  all  the  wives  of  our 
neighbors.  No,  my  children,'  continued  I,  more  gravely, 
*  those  gowns  may  be  altered  into  something  of  a  plainer 
cut;  for  finery  is  very  unbecoming  in  us,  who  want  the 
means  of  decency,  I  do  not  know  whether  such  flouncing 
and  shredding  is  becoming  even  in  the  rich,  if  we  consider, 
upon  a  moderate  calculation,  that  the  nakedness  of  the 
indigent  world  might  be  clothed  from  the  trimmings  of 
the  vain.' 

"This  remonstrance  had  the  proper  effect:  they  went 
with  great  composure,  that  very  instant,  to  change  their 
dress;  and  the  next  day  I  had  the  satisfaction  of  finding 
my  daughters,  at  their  own  request,  employed  in  cutting 
up  their  trains  into  Sunday  waistcoats  for  Dick  and  Bill, 
the  two  little  ones;  and,  what  was  still  more  satisfactory, 
the  gowns  seemed  improved  by  this  curtailing."  And 
again  when  he  discovered  the  two  girls  making  a  wash  for 
their  faces:  "My  daughters  seemed  equally  busy  with  the 
rest;  and  I  observed  them  for  a  good  while  cooking  some- 
thing over  the  fire.  I  at  first  supposed  they  were  assisting 
their  mother,  but  little  Dick  informed  me  in  a  whisper 
that  they  were  making  a  wash  for  the  face.  Washes  of  all 
kinds  I  had  a  natural  antipathy  to;  for  I  knew  that,  in- 
stead of  mending  the  complexion,  they  spoil  it.  I  there- 
fore approached  my  chair  by  sly  degrees  to  the  fire,  and 
grasping  the  poker,  as  if  it  wanted  mending,  seemingly  by 


THE  VICAR  OF  WAKEFIELD.  71 

accident  overturned  the  whole  composition,  and  it  was  too 
late  to  begin  another/' 

And  this  is  done  with  such  a  light,  homely  touch,  that 
one  gets  familiarly  to  know  these  people  without  being 
aware  of  it.  There  is  no  insistence.  There  is  no  dragging 
you  along  by  the  collar;  confronting  you  with  certain 
figures;  and  compelling  you  to  look  at  this  and  study  that. 
The  artist  stands  by  you,  and  laughs  in  his  quiet  way; 
and  you  are  laughing  too,  when  suddenly  you  find  that 
human  beings  have  silently  come  into  the  void  before  you; 
and  you  know  them  for  friends;  and  even  after  the  vision 
has  faded  away,  and  the  beautiful  light  and  color  and  glory 
of  romance-land  have  vanished,  you  cannot  forget  them. 
They  have  become  part  of  your  life;  you  will  take  them  to 
the  grave  with  you. 

The  story,  as  every  one  perceives,  has  its  obvious  blem- 
ishes. "There  are  an  hundred  faults  in  this  thing,"  says 
Goldsmith  himself,  in  the  prefixed  advertisement.  But 
more  particularly,  in  the  midst  of  all  the  impossibilities 
taking  place  in  and  around  the  Jail,  when  the  chameleon- 
like  deus  ex  machmd,  Mr.  Jenkinson,  winds  up  the  tale 
in  hot  haste,  Goldsmith  pauses  to  put  in  a  sort  of  apology. 
*'Nor  can  I  go  on  without  a  reflection,"  he  says  gravely, 
*'on  those  accidental  meetings,  which,  though  they  hap- 
pen every  day,  seldom  excite  our  surprise  but  upon  some 
extraordinary  occasion.  To  what  a  fortuitous  concurrence 
do  we  not  owe  every  pleasure  and  convenience  of  our  lives! 
How  many  seeming  accidents  must  unite  before  we  can  be 
clothed  or  fed  I  The  peasant  must  be  disposed  to  labor,  the 
shower  must  fall,  the  wind  fill  the  merchant's  sail,  or  num- 
bers must  want  the  usual  supply."  This  is  Mr.  Thackeray's 
''simple  rogue"  appearing  again  in  adult  life.  Certainly, 
if  our  supply  of  food  and  clothing  depended  on  such  acci- 
dents as  happened  to  make  the  Vicar's  family  happy  all  at 
once,  there  would  be  a  good  deal  of  shivering  and  starva- 
tion in  the  world.  Moreover  it  may  be  admitted  that  on 
occasion  Goldsmith's  fine  instinct  deserts  him;  and  even  in 
describing  those  domestic  relations  which  are  the  charm  of 
the  novel,  he  blunders  into  the  unnatural.  When  Mr. 
Burchell,  for  example,  leaves  the  house  in  consequence  of 
a  quarrel  with  Mrs.  Primrose,  the  Vicar  questions  his 
daughter  as  to  whether  she  had  received  from  that  poor 


73  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

gentleman  any  testimony  of  his  affection  for  her.  She 
replies  No;  but  remembers  to  have  heard  him  remark  that 
he  never  knew  a  woman  who  could  find  merit  in  a  man 
that  was  poor.  "  Such,  my  dear,"  continued  the  Vicar, 
"  is  the  common  cant  of  all  the  unfortunate  or  idle.  But 
I  hope  you  have  been  taught  to  judge  properly  of  such 
men,  and  that  it  would  be  even  madness  to  expect  happi- 
ness from  one  who  has  been  so  very  bad  an  economist  of 
his  own.  Your  mother  and  I  have  now  better  prospects 
for  you.  The  next  winter,  which  you  will  probably  spend 
in  town,  will  give  you  opportunities  of  making  a  more 
prudent  choice."  Now  it  is  not  at  all  likely  that  a  father, 
however  anxious  to  have  his  daughter  well  married  and 
settled,  would  ask  her  so  delicate  a  question  in  open  domes- 
tic circle,  and  would  then  publicly  inform  her  that  she  was 
expected  to  choose  a  husband  on  her  forthcoming  visit  to 
town. 

Whatever  may  be  said  about  any  particular  incident 
like  this,  the  atmosphere  of  the  book  is  true.  Goethe, 
to  whom  a  German  translation  of  the  Vicaj-  was  read  by 
Herder  some  four  years  after  the  publication  in  England, 
not  only  declared  it  at  the  time  to  be  one  of  the  best 
novels  ever  written,  but  again  and  again  throughout  liis 
life  reverted  to  the  charm  and  delight  with  which  he  had 
made  the  acquaintance  of  the  English  "prose  id  3d,"  and 
took  it  for  granted  that  it  was  a  real  picture  of  English 
life.  Despite  all  the  machinery  of  Mr.  Jenkinson's  schemes, 
who  could  doubt?  Again  and  again  there  are  recui-rent 
strokes  of  such  vividness  and  naturalness  that  we  yield 
altogether  to  the  necromancer.  Look  at  this  perfect  pict- 
ure— of  human  emotion  and  outside  nature — put  in  a  few 
sentences.  The  old  clergyman,  after  being  in  search  of 
his  daughter,  has  found  her,  and  is  now — having  left  her 
in  an  inn — returning  to  his  family  and  home.  *'  And  now 
my  heart  caught  new  sensations  of  pleasure,  the  nearer  I 
approached  that  peaceful  mansion.  As  a  bird  that  had 
been  frighted  from  its  nest,  my  affections  outwent  my 
haste,  and  hovered  round  my  little  fireside  with  all  the 
rapture  of  expectation.  I  called  up  the  many  fond  things 
I  had  to  say,  and  anticipated  the  welcome  I  was  to  receive. 
I  already  felt  my  wife^s  tender  embrace,  and  smiled  at  the 
joy  of  my  little  ones.     As  I  walked  but  slowly,  the  night 


THE  VICAR  OF  WAKEFIELD.  73 

waned  apace.  The  laborers  of  the  day  were  all  retired  to 
rest;  the  lights  were  out  in  every  cottage;  no  sounds  were 
heard  but  of  the  shrilling  cock,  and  the  deep-mouthed 
watch-dog  at  hollow  distance.  I  approached  my  little 
abode  of  pleasure,  and,  before  I  was  within  a  furlong  of 
the  place,  our  honest  mastiff  came  running  to  welcome 
me."  "  The  deep-mouthed tLHitch-dog at  hollow  distance" — 
what  more  perfect  description  of  the  stillness  of  night  was 
ever  given? 

And  then  there  are  other  qualities  in  this  delightful 
Vicar  of  Wakefield  than  merely  idyllic  tenderness,  and 
pathos,  and  sly  humor.  There  is  a  firm  presentation  of 
the  crimes  and  brutalities  of  the  world.  The  pure  light 
that  shines  within  that  domestic  circle  is  all  the  brighter 
because  of  the  black  outer  ring  that  is  here  and  there  in- 
dicated rather  than  described.  How  could  we  appreciate 
all  the  simplicities  of  the  good  man's  household,  but  for 
the  rogueries  with  which  they  are  brought  in  contact? 
And  although  we  laugh  at  Moses  and  his  gross  of  green 
spectacles,  and  the  manner  in  which  the  Vicar's  wife  and 
daughter  are  imposed  on  by  Miss  Wilhelmina  Skeggs  and 
Lady  Blarney,  with  their  lords  and  ladies  and  their  tributes 
to  virtue,  there  is  no  laughter  demanded  of  us  when  we 
find  the  simplicity  and  moral  dignity  of  the  Vicar  meeting 
and  beating  the  jeers  and  taunts  of  the  abandoned  wretches 
in  the  prison.  This  is  really  a  remarkable  episode.  The 
author  was  under  the  obvious  temptation  to  make  much 
comic  material  out  of  the  situation;  while  another  tempta- 
tion, toward  the  goody-goody  side,  was  not  far  off.  But 
the  Vicar  undertakes  the  duty  of  reclaiming  these  cast- 
aways with  a  modest  patience  and  earnestness  in  every  way 
in  keeping  with  his  character;  while  they,  on  the  otlier 
hand,  are  not  too  easily  moved  to  tears  of  repentance.  His 
first  efforts,  it  will  be  remembered,  were  not  too  successful. 
"  Their  insensibility  excited  my  highest  compassion,  and 
blotted  my  own  uneasiness  from  my  mind.  It  even  ap- 
peared a  duty  incumbent  upon  me  to  attempt  to  reclaim 
them.  I  resolved,  therefore,  once  more  to  return,  and,  in 
&pite  of  their  contempt,  to  give  them  my  advice,  and  con- 
quer tiiem  by  my  perseverance.  Going,  tlierefore,  among 
them  again,  I  informed  Mr.  Jenkinson  of  my  design,  at 
which  he  laughed  heartily,  but  communicated  it  to  the  rest. 


74  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

The  proposal  was  received  with  the  greatest  good-humor, 
as  it  promised  to  afford  a  new  fund  of  entertainment  to 
persons  who  had  now  no  other  resource  for  mirth  but  what 
could  be  derived  from  ridicule  or  debauchery. 

"  I  therefore  read  them  a  portion  of  the  service  with  a 
loud,  unaffected  voice,  and  found  my  audience  perfectly 
merry  upon  the  occasion.  Lewd  whispers,  groans  of  con- 
trition burlesqued,  winking  and  coughing,  alternately  ex- 
cited laughter.  However,  I  continued  with  my  natural 
solemnity  to  read  on,  sensible  that  what  I  did  might  mend 
some,  but  could  itself  receive  no  contamination  from  any. 

"  After  reading,  1  entered  upon  my  exhortation,  which 
was  rather  calculated  at  first  to  amuse  them  than  to  re- 
prove. I  previously  observed,  that  no  other  motive  but 
their  welfare  could  induce  me  to  this;  that  I  was  their 
fellow-prisoner,  and  now  got  nothing  by  preaching.  I 
was  sorry,  I  said,  to  hear  them  so  very  profane;  because 
they  got  nothing  by  it,  but  might  lose  a  great  deal :  *  For 
be  assured,  my  friends,^  cried  I — '  for  you  are  my  friends, 
however  the  world  may  disclaim  your  friendship — though 
you  swore  twelve  thousand  oaths  in  a  day,  it  would  not  put 
one  penny  in  your  purse.  Then  what  signifies  calling 
every  moment  upon  the  devil,  and  courting  his  friendship, 
since  you  find  howscurvilyhe  uses  you?  He  has  given  you 
nothing  here,  you  find,  but  a  mouthful  of  oaths  and  an 
empty  belly;  and,  by  the  best  accounts  I  have  of  him,  he 
will  give  you  nothing  that's  good  hereafter. 

"  '  If  used  ill  in  our  dealings  with  one  man,  we  naturally 
go  elsewhere.  Were  it  not  worth  your  while,  then,  just  to 
try  how  you  may  like  the  usage  of  another  master, 
who  gives  you  fair  promises  at  least  to  come  to  him? 
Surely,  my  friends,  of  all  stupidity  in  the  world,  his  must 
be  the  greatest,  who,  after  robbing  a  house,  runs  to  the 
thief-takers  for  protection.  And  yet,  how  are  you  more 
wise?  You  are  all  seeking  comfort  from  one  that  has 
already  betrayed  you,  applying  to  a  more  malicious  being 
than  any  thief-taker  of  them  all;  for  they  only  decoy  and 
then  hang  you;  but  he  decoys  and  hangs,  and,  what  is 
worst  of  all,  will  not  let  you  loose  after  the  hangman  has 
done.' 

**  When  I  had  concluded,  I  received  the  compliments  of 
my  audience,  some  of  whom  came  and  shook  me  by  the 


TEE  VICAR  OF  WAKEFIELD.  75 

hand,  swearing  that  I  was  a  very  honest  fellow,  and  that 
they  desired  my  further  acquaintance.  I  therefore  prom- 
ised to  repeat  my  lecture  next  day,  and  actually  con- 
ceived some  hopes  of  making  a  reformation  here;  for  it  had 
ever  been  my  opinion,  that  no  man  was  past  the  hour  of 
amendment,  every  heart  lying  open  to  the  shafts  of  re- 
proof, if  the  archer  could  but  take  a  proper  aim." 

His  wife  and  children,  naturally  dissuading  him  from  an 
effort  which  seemed  to  them  only  to  bring  ridicule  upon 
him,  are  met  by  a  grave  rebuke;  and  on  the  next  morning 
he  descends  to  the  common  prison,  where,  he  says,  he 
found  the  prisoners  very  merry,  expecting  his  arrival,  and 
each  prepared  to  play  some  jail-trick  on  the  Doctor. 

"  There  was  one  whose  trick  gave  more  universal  pleasure 
than  all  the  rest;  for,  observing  the  manner  in  which  I 
had  disposed  my  books  on  the  table  before  me,  he  very 
dexterously  displaced  one  of  them,  and  put  an  obscene  jest- 
book  of  his  own  in  the  place.  However,  I  took  no  notice 
of  all  that  this  mischievous  group  of  little  beings  could  do, 
but  went  on,  perfectly  sensible  that  what  was  ridiculous  in 
my  attempt  would  excite  mirth  only  the  first  or  second 
time,  while  what  was  serious  would  be  permanent.  My 
design  succeeded,  and  in  less  than  six  days  some  were  peni- 
tent and  all  attentive. 

"It  was  now  that  I  applauded  my  perseverance  and 
address,  at  thus  giving  sensibility  to  wretches  divested  of 
every  moral  feeling,  and  now  began  to  think  of  doing  them 
temporal  services  also,  by  rendering  their  situation  some- 
what more  comfortable.  Their  time  had  hitherto  been 
divided  between  famine  and  excess,  tumultuous  riot  and 
bitter  repining.  Their  only  employment  was  quarreling 
among  each  other,  playing  at  cribbage,  and  cutting 
tobacco-stoppers.  From  this  last  mode  of  idle  industry  I 
took  the  hint  of  setting  such  as  choose  to  work  at  cutting 
pegs  for  tobacconists  and  shoemakers,  the  proper  wood 
being  bought  by  a  general  subscription,  and,  when  manu- 
factured, sold  by  my  appointment;  so  that  each  earned 
something  every  day — a  triile  indeed,  but  suflicient  to 
maintain  him. 

"  I  did  not  stop  here,  but  instituted  fines  for  the  punish- 
ment of  immorality,  and  rewards  for  peculiar  industry. 
Thus,  in  less  than  a  fortnight  I  had  formed  them  into 

22— Q  &  G— D 


76  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

something  social  and  humane,  and  had  the  pleasure  of 
regarding  myself  as  a  legislator  who  had  brouglit  men 
from  their  native  ferocity  into  friendship  and  obedience.'* 

Of  course,  all  this  about  jails  and  thieves  was  calculated 
to  sliock  the  nerves  of  those  who  liked  their  literature  per- 
fumed with  rose-water.  Madame  Eiccoboni,  to  whom 
Burke  had  sent  the  book,  wrote  to  Garrick,  "  Le  plaidoyer 
en  favour  des  voleurs,  des  petits  larrons,  des  gens  de  mau- 
vaises  moeurs,  est  fort  eloigne  de  me  plaire."  Others,  no 
doubt,  considered  the  introduction  of  Miss  Skeggs  and 
Lady  Blarney  as  **  vastly  low.''  But  the  curious  thing  is 
that  the  literary  critics  of  the  day  seem  to  have  been 
altogether  silent  about  the  book — perhaps  they  were 
''puzzled"  by  it,  as  Southey  has  suggested.  Mr.  Forster, 
who  took  the  trouble  to  search  the  periodical  literature  of 
the  time,  says  that,  ^'  apart  from  bald  recitals  of  the  plot, 
not  a  word  was  said  in  the  way  of  criticism  about  the 
book,  either  in  praise  or  blame."  The  St.  James' 
Chronicle  did  not  condescend  to  notice  its  appearance,  and 
the  MontTily  Revieio  confessed  frankly  that  nothing  was  to 
be  made  of  it.  The  better  sort  of  newspapers,  as  well  as 
the  more  dignified  reviews,  contemptuously  left  it  to  the 
patronage  of  Lloyd's  Evening  Post,  the  London  Chronicle, 
and  journals  of  that  class;  which  simply  informed  their 
readers  that  a  new  novel,  called  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield, 
had  been  published,  that  "  the  editor  is  Doctor  Goldsmith, 
who  has  affixed  his  name  to  an  introductory  advertise- 
ment, and  that  such  and  such  were  the  incidents  of  the 
story."  Even  his  friends,  with  the  exception  of  Burke, 
did  not  seem  to  consider  that  any  remarkable  new  birth  in 
literature  had  occurred;  and  it  is  probable  that  this  was  a 
still  greater  disappointment  to  Goldsmith,  who  was  so 
anxious  to  be  thought  well  of  at  the  Club.  However,  the 
public  took  to  the  story.  A  second  edition  was  published 
in  May;  a  third  in  August.  Goldsmith,  it  is  true,  received 
no  pecuniary  gain  from  this  success,  for,  as  we  have  seen, 
Johnson  had  sold  the  novel  outright  to  Francis  Newbery; 
but  his  name  was  growing  in  importance  with  the  book- 
sellers. 

There  was  need  that  it  should,  for  his  increasing  ex- 
penses— his  fine  clothes,  his  suppers,  his  whist  at  the 
Devil  Tavern — were  involving  him  in  deeper  and  deeper 


THE  VICAR  OF  WAKEFIELD.  77 

difficulties.  How  was  he  to  extricate  himself? — or  rather 
the  question  that  would  naturally  occur  to  Goldsmith 
was  liow  was  he  to  continue  that  hand-to-mouth  existence 
that  had  its  compensations  along  with  its  troubles?  Novels 
like  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield  are  not  written  at  a  moment's 
notice,  even  though  any  Newbery,  judging  by  results,  is 
wilHng  to  double  that  £60  which  Johnson  considered  to  be 
a  fair  price  for  the  story  at  the  time.  There  was  the  usual 
resource  of  hack-writing;  and,  no  doubt,  Goldsmith  was 
compelled  to  fall  back  on  that,  if  only  to  keep  the  elder 
Newbery,  in  whose  debt  he  was,  in  a  good  humor.  But 
the  author  of  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield  may  be  excused  if  he 
looked  round  to  see  if  there  was  not  some  more  profitable 
work  for  him  to  turn  his  hand  to.  It  was  at  this  time  that 
he  began  to  think  of  writing  a  comedy. 


78  ^^^^  OF  QOLDHMITH. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

THE   GOOD-NATURED   MAN. 

Amid  much  miscellaneous  work,  mostly  of  the  compila- 
tion order,  the  play  of  the  Good-natured  Man  began  to 
assume  concrete  form;  insomuch  that  Johnson,  always  the 
friend  of  this  erratic  Irishman,  had  promised  to  write  a 
prologue  for  it.  It  is  with  regard  to  this  prologue  that 
Boswell  tells  a  foolish  and  untrustworthy  story  about  Gold- 
smith. Dr.  Johnson  had  recently  been  honored  by  an  in- 
terview with  his  Sovereign;  and  the  members  of  the  Club 
were  in  the  habit  of  flattering  him  by  begging  for  a  repe- 
tition of  his  account  of  that  famous  event.  On  one  occa- 
sion, during  this  recital,  Boswell  relates,  Goldsmith 
''  remained  unmoved  upon  a  sofa  at  some  distance,  affect- 
ing not  to  join  in  the  least  in  the  eager  curiosity  of  the 
company.  He  assigned  as  a  reason  for  his  gloom  and 
seeming  inattention  that  he  apprehended  Johnson  had  re- 
linquished his  purpose  of  furnishing  him  with  a  prologue 
to  his  play,  with  the  hopes  of  which  he  had  been  flattered; 
but  it  was  strongly  suspected  that  he  was  fretting  with 
chagrin  and  envy  at  the  singular  honor  Doctor  Johnson 
had  lately  enjoyed.  At  length  the  frankness  and  simplicity 
of  his  natural  character  prevailed.  He  sprung  from  the 
sofa,  advanced  to  Johnson,  and,  in  a  kind  of  flutter,  from 
imagining  himself  in  the  situation  which  he  had  just  been 
hearing  described,  exclaimed,  '  Well,  you  acquitted  your- 
self in  this  conversation  better  than  I  should  have  done; 
for  I  should  have  bowed  and  stammered  through  the  whole 
of  it.'"  It  is  obvious  enough  that  the  only  part  of  this 
anecdote  which  is  quite  worthy  of  credence  is  the  actual 
phrase  used  by  Goldsmith,  which  is  full  of  his  customary 
generosity  and  self-depreciation.  All  those  "suspicions" 
of  his  envy  of  his  friend  may  safely  be  discarded,  for  they 
are  mere  guess-work;  even  though  it  might  have  been  nat- 


THE  OOOD-NATURED  MAN.  79 

ural  enough  for  a  man  like  Goldsmith,  conscious  of  his 
singular  and  original  genius,  to  measure  himself  against 
Johnson,  who  was  merely  a  man  of  keen  perception  and 
shrewd  reasoning,  and  to  compare  the  deference  paid  to 
Johnson  with  the  scant  courtesy  shown  to  himself. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  prologue  was  written  by  Dr. 
Johnson;  and  the  now  complete  comedy  was,  after  some 
little  arrangement  of  personal  differences  between  Gold- 
smith and  Garrick,  very  kindly  undertaken  by  Reynolds, 
submitted  for  Garrick's  approval.  But  nothing  came  of 
Reynolds's  intervention.  Perhaps  Goldsmith  resented 
Garrick's  airs  of  patronage  toward  a  poor  devil  of  an  author.; 
perhaps  Garrick  was  surprised  by  the  manner  in  which 
well-intentioned  criticisms  were  taken;  at  all  events,  after 
a  good  deal  of  shilly-shallying,  the  play  was  taken  out  of 
Garrick's  hands.  Fortunately  a  project  was  just  at  this 
moment  on  foot  for  starting  the  rival  theater  in  Covent 
Garden,  under  the  management  of  George  Colman;  and  to 
Colman  Goldsmith's  play  was  forthwith  consigned.  The 
play  was  accepted;  but  it  was  a  long  time  before  it  was  pro- 
duced; and  in  that  interval  it  may  fairly  be  presumed  the 
res  angusta  domi  of  Goldsmith  did  not  become  any  more 
free  and  generous  than  before.  It  was  in  this  interval  that 
the  elder  Newberry  died;  Goldsmith  had  one  patron  the 
less.  Another  patron  who  oifered  himself  was  civilly  bowed 
to  the  door.  This  is  an  incident  in  Goldsmith's  career 
which,  like  his  interview  with  the  Earl  of  Northumberland, 
should  ever  be  remembered  in  his  honor.  The  Govern- 
ment of  the  day  were  desirous  of  enlisting  on  their  behalf 
the  services  of  writers  of  somewhat  better  position  than  the" 
mere  libellers  whose  pens  were  the  slaves  of  anybody's 
purse;  and  a  Mr.  Scott,  a  chaplain  of  Lord  Sandwich,  ap- 
pears to  have  imagined  that  it  would  be  worth  while  to  buy 
Goldsmith.  lie  applied  to  Goldsmith  in  due  course;  and 
this  is  an  account  of  the  interview:  **  I  found  him  in  a  mis- 
erable set  of  chambers  in  the  Temple.  I  told  him  my 
authority;  I  told  him  I  was  empowered  to  pay  most  liber- 
ally for  his  exertions;  and,  would  you  believe  it!  he  was  so 
absurd  as  to  say,  '  I  can  earn  as  much  as  will  supply  my 
wants  without  writing  for  any  party;  the  assistance  you 
offer  is  therefore  unnecessary  to  me.'  And  I  left  him  in 
his  garret."    Needy  as  he  was,  Goldsmith  had  too  much 


80  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

self-respect  to  become  a  paid  libeller  and  cut-throat  of 
public  reputations. 

On  the  evening  of  Friday,  the  29th  of  January,  1768, 
when  Goldsmith  had  now  reached  the  age  of  forty,  the 
comedy  of  Tlie  Good-natured  Man  was  produced  at  Covent 
Garden  Theater.  The  prologue  had,  according  to  prom- 
ise, been  written  by  Johnson;  and  a  very  singular  prologue 
it  was.  Even  Boswell  was  struck  by  the  odd  contrast  be- 
tween this  sonorous  piece  of  melancholy  and  the  fun  that 
was  to  follow.  ''The  first  lines  of  this  prologue,''  he  con- 
scientiously remarks,  ''are  strongly  characteristical  of  the 
dismal  gloom  of  his  mind;  which,  in  his  case,  as  in  the 
case  of  all  who  are  distressed  with  the  same  malady  of 
imagination,  transfers  to  others  its  own  feelings.  AVho 
could  suppose  it  was  to  introduce  a  comedy,  when  Mr. 
Lensley  solemnly  begun — 

"  '  Pressed  with,  the  load  of  life,  the  weary  mind 
Surveys  the  general  toil  of  humankind  V 

But  this  dark  ground  might  make  Goldsmith's  humor 
shine  the  more."  When  we  come  to  the  comedy  itself,  we 
find  but  little  bright  humor  in  the  opening  passages.  The 
author  is  obviously  timid,  anxious,  and  constrained.  There 
is  nothing  of  the  brisk,  confident  vivacity  with  which  She 
Stoops  to  Conquer  opens.  The  novice  does  not  yet  under- 
stand the  art  of  making  his  characters  explain  themselves; 
and  accordingly  the  benevolent  uncle  and  honest  Jarvis  in- 
dulge in  a  conversation  which,  laboriously  descriptive  of  the 
character  of  young  Honey  wood,  is  spoken  "at"  the 
audience.  With  the  entrance  of  young  Honeywood  him- 
self. Goldsmith  endeavors  to  become  a  little  more  sprightly; 
but  there  is  still  anxiety  hanging  over  him,  and  the  epi- 
grams are  little  more  than  merely  formal  antitheses. 

"Jarvis.  This  bill  from  your  tailor;  this  from  your  mercer;  and 
this  from  the  little  broker  in  Crooked  Lane.  He  says  he  has  been  at 
a  great  deal  of  trouble  to  get  back  the  money  you  borrowed. 

"  Hon.  That  I  don't  know;  but  I'm  sure  we  were  at  a  great  deal  of 
trouble  in  getting  him  to  lend  it. 

"Jar.  He  has  lost  all  patience. 

"  Hon.  Then  he  has  lost  a  very  good  thing. 

"  Jar.  There's  that  ten  guineas  you  were  sending  to  the  poor  gen- 
tleman and  his  children  in  the  Fleet.  I  believe  that  would  stop  his 
mouth,  for  a  while  at  least. 


THE  GOOD-NATURED  MAN.  81 

"  Hon.  Ay,  Jarvis,  but  what  will  fill  their  mouths  in  the  mean- 
time? " 

This  young  Honeywood,  the  hero  of  the  play,  is,  and 
remains  throughout,  a  somewhat  ghostly  personage.  He 
has  attributes,  but  no  flesh  or  blood.  There  is  much  more 
substance  in  the  next  character  introduced — the  inimitable 
Croaker,  who  revels  in  evil  forbodings  and  drinks  deep  of 
the  luxury  of  woe.  These  are  the  two  chief  characters; 
but  then  a  play  must  have  a  plot.  And  perhaps  it  would 
not  be  fair,  so  far  as  the  plot  is  concerned,  to  judge  of  The 
Good- natured  Ma)i  merely  as  a  literary  production.  Intri- 
cacies that  seem  tedious  and  puzzling  on  paper  appear  to 
be  clear  enough  on  the  stage;  it  is  much  more  easy  to  re- 
member the  history  and  circumstances  of  a  person  whom 
we  see  before  us,  than  to  attach  these  to  a  mere  name — 
especially  as  the  name  is  sure  to  be  clipped  down  from 
Honeywood  to  Hon.  and  from  Leontine  to  Leon.  How- 
ever, it  is  in  the  midst  of  all  the  cross-purposes  of  the 
lovers  that  we  once  more  come  upon  our  old  friend  Beau 
Tibbs — though  Mr,  Tibbs  is  now  in  much  better  circum- 
stances, and  has  been  renamed  by  his  creator  Jack  Lofty. 
Garrick  had  objected  to  the  introduction  of  Jack,  on  the 
ground  that  he  was  only  a  distraction.  But  Goldsmith, 
whether  in  writing  a  novel  or  a  play,  was  more  anxious  to 
represent  human  nature  than  to  prune  a  plot,  and  paid  but 
little  respect  to  the  unities,  if  only  he  could  arouse  our  in- 
terest. And  who  is  not  delighted  with  this  Jack  Lofty 
and  his  "duchessy  "  talk — his  airs  of  patronage,  his  mys- 
terious hints,  his  gay  familiarity  with  the  great,  his  auda- 
cious lying? 

"  Lofty.  Waller?    Waller?    Is  he  of  the  house? 

"  Mrs.  Croaker.  The  modern  poet  of  that  name.  sir. 

"  Lof.  Oh,  a  modern!  We  men  of  business  despise  the  moderns; 
and  as  for  the  ancients,  we  have  no  time  to  read  them.  Poetry  is  a 
pretty  thing  enough  for  our  wives  and  daughters;  but  not  for  us. 
Why  now,  here  1  stand  that  know  nothing  of  books.  I  say,  madam, 
I  know  nothing  of  books;  and  yet,  1  beUeve,  upon  a  land-carriage 
fishery,  a  stamp  act,  or  a  jag-hire,  I  can  talk  my  two  hours  without 
feeling  the  want  of  them. 

'^  Mrs.  Gro.  The  world  is  no  stranger  to  Mr.  Lofty's  eminence  in 
every  capacity. 

"  Lof.  I  vow  to  gad,  madam,  you  make  me  blush.  I'm  nothing, 
nothing,  nothing  in  the  world;  a  mere  obscure  gentleman.     To  be  sure 


82  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

indeed,  one  or  two  of  the  present  ministers  are  pleased  to  represent  me 
as  a  formidable  man.  I  know  they  are  pleased  to  bespatter  me  at  all 
their  little  dirty  levees.  Yet,  upon  my  soul,  I  wonder  what  they  see 
in  me  to  treat  me  so!  Measures,  not  men,  have  always  been  my 
mark ;  and  I  vow,  by  all  that's  honorable,  my  resentment  has  never 
done  the  men,  as  mere  men,  any  manner  of  harm — that  is,  as  mere 
men. 

"Mrs.  Cro.  What  importance,  and  yet  what  modesty! 

"  Lof.  Oh,  if  you  talk  of  modesty,  madam,  there,  I  own,  I'm 
accessible  to  praise:  modesty  is  my  foible:  it  was  so  the  Duke  of 
Brentford  used  to  say  of  me.  'I  love  Jack  Lofty,' he  used  to  say: 
'  no  man  has  a  finer  knowledge  of  things;  quite  a  man  of  informa- 
tion; and  when  he  speaks  upon  his  legs,  by  the  Lord  he's  prodigious, 
he  scouts  them;  and  yet  all  men  have  their  faults;  too  much  modesty 
is  his, '  says  his  grace. 

"Mrs  Cro.  And  yet,  I  dare  say,  you  don't  want  assurance  when 
you  come  to  solicit  for  your  friends. 

"  Lof.  Oh,  there  indeed  I'm  in  bronze.  Apropos!  I  have  just 
heen  mentioning  Miss  Richland's  case  to  a  certain  personage;  we 
must  name  no  names.  When  I  ask,  I  am  not  to  be  put  off,  madam. 
No,  no,  I  take  my  friend  by  the  button.  A  fine  girl,  sir;  great  justice 
in  her  case.  A  frienJl  of  mine^ — borough  interest — business  must  be 
done,  Mr.  Secretary. — I  say,  Mr.  Secretary,  her  business  must  be 
done,  sir.     That's  my  way,  madam. 

"Mrs  Cro.  Bless  me!  you  said  all  this  to  the  Secretary  of  State, 
did  you? 

"  Lof.  I  did  not  say  the  Secretary,  did  I?  Well,  curse  it,  since  you 
have  found  me  out,  I  will  not  deny  it.     It  was  to  the  Secretary." 

Strangely  enough,  what  may  now  seem  to  some  of  us 
the  very  best  scene  in  the  Good-natured  Man — the  scene, 
that  is,  in  which  young  Honeywood,  suddenly  finding  Miss 
Richland  without,  is  compelled  to  dress  up  the  two  bailiifs 
in  possession  of  his  house  and  introduce  them  to  her  as 
gentlemen  friends — was  very  nearly  damning  the  play  on  the 
first  night  of  its  production.  The  pit  was  of  the  opinion  that 
it  was  *'  low,"  and  subsequently  the  critics  took  up  the  cry, 
and  professed  themselves  to  be  so  greatly  shocked  by  the  vul- 
gar humors  of  the  bailiffs  that  Goldsmith  had  to  cut  them 
out.  But  on  the  opening  night  the  anxious  author,  who  had 
been  rendered  nearly  distracted  by  the  cries  and  hisses 
produced  by  this  soene,  was  somewhat  reassured  when  the 
audience  began  to  laugh  again  over  the  tribulations  of  Mr. 
Croaker.  To  the  actor  who  played  the  part  he  expressed 
his  warm  gratitude  when  the  piece  was  over,  assuring  him 
that  he  had  exceeded  his  own  conception  of  the  character, 
and  that  *'  the  fine  comic  richness  of  his  coloring  made  it 


TEE  GOOD-NATURED  MAN.  83 

almost  appear  as  new  to  him  as  to  any  other  person  in  the 
house." 

The  new  play  had  been  on  the  whole  favorably  received; 
and,  when  Goldsmith  went  along  afterward  to  the  Club, 
his  companions  were  doubtless  not  at  all  surprised  to  find 
him  in  good  spirits.  He  was  even  merrier  than  usual,  and 
consented  to  sing  his  favorite  ballad  about  the  Old  Woman 
tossed  in  a  Blanket.  But  those  hisses  and  cries  were  still 
rankling  in  his  memory;  and  he  himself  subsequently  con- 
fessed that  he  was  ''suffering  horrid  tortures."  Nay, 
when  the  other  members  of  the  Club  had  gone,  leaving 
him  and  Johnson  together,  he  "burst  out  a-crying,  and 

even  swore   by that  he  would   never  write  again." 

When  Goldsmith  told  this  story  in  after-days,  Johnson  was 
naturally  astonished;  perhaps — himself  not  suffering  much 
from  an  excessive  sensitiveness — he  may  have  attributed 
that  little  burst  of  hysterical  emotion  to  the  excitement  of 
the  evening  increased  by  a  glass  or  two  of  punch,  and  de- 
termined therefore  never  to  mention  it.  "  All  which. 
Doctor,"  he  said,  "  I  thought  had  been  a  secret  between 
you  and  me;  and  I  am  sure  I  would  not  have  said  anything 
about  it  for  the  world."  Indeed  there  was  little  to  cry 
over,  either  in  the  first  reception  of  the  piece  or  in  its  sub- 
sequent fate.  With  the  offending  bailiffs  cut  out,  the 
comedy  would  seem  to  have  been  fairly  successful.  The 
proceeds  of  three  of  the  evenings  were  Goldsmith's  pay- 
ment; and  in  this  manner  he  received  £400,  Then  Griffin 
published  the  play;  and  from  this  source  Goldsmith  re- 
ceived an  additional  £100;  so  that  altogether  he  was  very 
well  paid  for  his  work.  Moreover  he  had  appealed  against 
the  judgment  of  the  pit  and  the  dramatic  critics,  by  print- 
^lig  in  the  published  edition  the  bailiff  scene  which  had 
been  removed  from  the  stage;  and  the  Monthly  Revieio 
was  so  extremely  kind  as  to  say  that  "  the  bailiff  and  his 
blackguard  follower  appeared  intolerable  on  the  stage,  yet 
we  are  not  disgusted  with  them  in  the  perusal,"  Perhaps 
we  have  grown  less  scrupulous  since  then;  but  at  all  events 
it  would  be  difficult  for  anybody  nowadays  to  find  anything 
but  good-natured  fun  in  that  famous  scene.  There  is  an 
occasional  "dam,"  it  is  true;  but  then  English  officers 
have  always  been  permitted  that  little  playfulness,  and 
these  two    gentlemen   were   supposed    to   "serve  in   the 


84  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Fleet;"  while  if  they  had  been  particularly  refined  in  their 
speech  and  manner,  how  could  the  author  have  aroused 
Miss  Richland's  suspicions?  It  is  possible  that  the  two 
actors  who  played  the  baliff  and  his  follower  may  have  in- 
troduced some  vulgar  "gag"  into  their  parts;  but  there  is 
no  warranty  for  anything  of  the  kind  in  the  play  as  we 
now  read  it. 


GOLDSMITH  IN  SOCIETY,  85 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

GOLDSMITH   IN   SOCIETY. 

The  appearance  of  the  Good-Natured  Man  ushered  in 
a  halcyon  period  in  Goldsmith's  life.  The  Traveller  and 
the  Vicar  had  gained  for  him  only  reputation:  this  new 
comedy  put  £500  in  his  pocket.  Of  course  that  was  too 
big  a  sum  for  Goldsmith  to  have  about  him  long.  Four- 
fifths  of  it  he  immediately  expended  on  the  purchase  and 
decoration  of  a  set  of  chambers  in  Brick  Court,  Middle 
Temple;  with  the  remainder  he  appears  to  have  begun  a 
series  of  entertainments  in  this  new  abode,  which  were 
perhaps  more  remarkable  for  their  mirth  than  their  deco- 
rum. There  was  no  sort  of  frolic  in  which  Goldsmith 
would  not  indulge  for  the  amusement  of  his  guests;  he 
would  sing  them  songs,  he  would  throw  his  wig  to  the 
ceiling;  he  would  dance  a  minuet.  And  then  they  had 
cards,  forfeits,  blind-man's-buff,  until  Mr.  Blackstone, 
then  engaged  on  his  Commentaries  in  the  rooms  below, 
was  driven  nearly  mad  by  the  uproar.  These  parties 
would  seem  to  have  been  of  a  most  nondescript  character 
— chance  gatherings  of  any  obscure  authors  or  actors  whom 
he  happened  to  meet;  but  from  time  to  time  there  were 
more  formal  entertainments,  at  which  Johnson,  Percy,  and 
similar  distinguished  persons  were  present.  Moreover,  Dr. 
Goldsmith  himself  was  much  asked  out  to  dinner  too;  and 
so,  not  content  with  the  "  Tyrian  bloom,  satin  grain  and 
garter,  blue-silk  breeches,"  which  Mr.  Filby  had  provided 
for  the  evening  of  the  production  of  the  comedy,  he  now 
had  another  suit  ''lined  with  silk,  and  gold  buttons,"  that 
he  might  appear  in  proper  guise.  Then  he  had  his  airs  of 
consequence  too.  This  was  liis  answer  to  an  invitation 
from  Kelly,  who  was  his  rival  of  the  hour:  "  I  would  Avith 
pleasure  accept  your  kind  invitation,  but  to  tell  you  the 
truth,  my  dear  boy,  my  Traveller  has  found  me  a  home  in 


86  LIFE  OF  00LD8MITE. 

so  many  places,  that  I  am  engaged,  I  believe,  three  days. 
Let  me  see.  To-day  I  dine  with  Edmund  Burke,  to- 
morrow with  Dr.  Nugent,  and  the  next  day  with  Topham 
Beauclerc;  but  I'll  tell  you  what  I'll  do  for  you,  I'll  dine 
with  you  on  Saturday."  Kelly  told  this  story  as  against 
Goldsmith;  but  surely  there  is  not  so  much  ostentation  in 
the  reply.  Directly  after  Tristram  Shandy  was  published, 
Sterne  found  himself  fourteen  deep  in  dinner  engagements: 
why  should  not  the  author  of  the  Traveller  and  the  Vicar 
and  the  Good-Natured  Man  have  his  engagements  also? 
And  perhaps  it  was  but  right  that  Mr.  Kelly,  who  was  after 
all  only  a  critic  and  scribbler,  though  he  had  written  a 
play  which  was  for  the  moment  enjoying  an  undeserved 
popularity,  should  be  given  to  understand  that  Dr.  Gold- 
smith was  not  to  be  asked  to  a  hole-and-corner  shop  at  a 
moment's  notice.  To-day  he  dines  with  Mr.  Burke;  to- 
morrow with  Dr.  Nugent;  the  day  after  with  Mr.  Beau- 
clerc. If  you  wish  to  have  the  honor  of  his  company,  you 
may  choose  a  day  after  that;  and  then,  with  his  new  wig, 
with  his  coat  of  Tyrian  bloom  and  blue-silk  breeches,  with 
a  smart  sword  at  his  side,  his  gold-headed  cane  in  his  hand, 
and  his  hat  under  his  elbow,  he  will  present  himself  in  due 
course.  Dr.  Goldsmith  is  announced,  and  makes  his 
grave  bow:  this  is  the  man  of  genius  about  whom  all  the 
town  is  talking;  the  friend  of  Burke,  of  Reynolds,  of 
Johnson,  of  Hogarth;  this  is  not  the  ragged  Irishman  who 
was  some  time  ago  earning  a  crust  by  running  errands  for 
an  apothecary. 

Goldsmith's  grand  airs,  however,  were  assumed  but 
seldom;  a\id  they  never  imposed  on  anybody.  His  ac- 
quaintances treated  him  with  a  familiarity  which  testified 
rather  to  his  good  nature  than  to  their  good  taste.  Now 
and  again,  indeed,  he  was  prompted  to  resent  this  famili- 
arity; but  the  effort  was  not  successful,  h\  the  ''high 
jinks  "  to  which  he  good-humoredly  resorted  for  the  enter- 
tainment of  his  guests  he  permitted  a  freedom  which  it 
was  afterward  not  very  easy  to  discard;  and  as  he  was 
always  ready  to  make  a  butt  of  himself  for  the  amusement 
of  his  friends  and  acquaintances,  it  came  to  be  recognized 
that  anybody  was  allowed  to  play  off  a  joke  on  *  Goldy.'* 
The  jokes,  such  of  them  as  have  been  put  on  raaord,  are 
of  the  poorest  sort.      The   horse-collar  is  never  far  off. 


GOLDSMITH  IN  SOCIETY.  87 

One  gladly  turns  from  these  dismal  humors  of  the  tavern 
and  the  club  to  the  picture  of  Goldsmith's  enjoying  what 
he  called  a  ''Shoemaker's  Holiday"  in  the  company  of  one 
or  two  chosen  intimates.  Goldsmith,  baited  and  bothered 
by  the  wits  of  a  public-house,  became  a  different  being 
when  he  had  assumed  the  guidance  of  a  small  party  of 
chosen  friends  bent  on  having  a  day's  frugal  pleasure. 
We  are  indebted  to  one  Cooke,  a  neighbor  of  Goldsmith's 
in  the  Temple,  not  only  for  a  most  interesting  description 
of  one  of  those  shoemaker's  holidays,  but  also  for  the 
knowledge  that  Goldsmith  had  even  now  begun  writing 
the  Deserted  Village,  which  was  not  published  till  1770, 
two  years  later.  Goldsmith,  though  he  could  turn  out 
plenty  of  manufactured  stuff  for  the  book-sellers,  worked 
slowly  at  the  special  story  or  poem  with  which  he  meant  to 
"strike  for  honest  fame."  This  Mr.  Cooke,  calling  on 
him  one  morning,  discovered  that  Goldsmith  had  that  day 
written  these  ten  lines  of  the  Deserted  Village : 

"  Dear  lovely  bowers  of  innocence  and  ease, 
Seats  of  my  youth,  when  every  sport  could  pleas©. 
How  often  have  I  loitered  o'er  thy  green. 
Where  humble  happiness  endeared  each  scenel 
How  often  have  I  paused  on  every  charm, 
The  sheltered  cot,  the  cultivated  farm, 
The  never-failing  brook,  the  busy  mill. 
The  decent  church,  that  topt  the  neighboring  hill, 
The  hawthorn  bush,  with  seats  beneath  the  shade. 
For  talking  age  and  whispering  lovers  made!" 

"Come,"  said  he,  "let  me  tell  you  this  is  no  bad  morn- 
ing's work;  and  now,  my  dear  boy,  if  you  are  not  better 
engaged,  I  should  be  glad  to  enjoy  a  shoemaker's  holiday 
with  you."  "  A  shoemaker's  holiday,"  continues  the 
writer  of  these  reminiscences,  "was  a  day  of  great  festivity 
to  poor  Goldsmith,  and  was  spent  in  the  following  inno- 
cent manner:  Three  or  four  of  his  intimate  friends  rendez- 
voused at  his  chambers  to  breakfast  about  ten  o'clock  in 
the  morning;  at  eleven  they  proceeded  by  the  City  Road 
and  through  the  fields  to  Highbury  Barn  to  dinner;  about 
six  o'clock  in  the  evening  they  adjourned  to  White  Con- 
duit House  to  drink  tea;  and  concluded  by  supping  at  the 
Grecian  or  Temple  Exchange  coffee-honse  or  at  the  Globe 
in  Fleet  Street.     There  was  a  very  good  ordi''itiry  of  two 


88  LIFE  OP  GOLDSMITH. 

dishes  and  pastry  kept  at  Highbury  Barn  about  this  time 
at  tenpence  per  head,  including  a  penny  to  the  waiter;  and 
the  company  generally  consisted  of  literary  characters,  a 
few  Templars,  and  some  citizens  who  had  left  off  trade. 
The  whole  expenses  of  the  day's  fete  never  exceeded  a 
crown,  and  oftener  were  from  three-and-sixpence  to  four 
shillings;  for  which  the  party  obtained  good  air  and  exer- 
cise, good  living,  the  example  of  simple  manners,  and  good 
conversation." 

It  would  have  been  well  indeed  for  Goldsmith  had  he 
been  possessed  of  sufficient  strength  of  character  to  remain 
satisfied  with  these  simple  pleasures,  and  to  have  lived  the 
quiet  and  modest  life  of  a  man  of  letters  on  such  income  as 
he  could  derive  from  the  best  work  he  could  produce.  But 
it  is  this  same  Mr.  Cooke  who  gives  decisive  testimony  as 
to  Goldsmith's  increasing  desire  to  "shine"  by  imitating 
the  expenditure  of  the  great;  the  natural  consequence  of 
which  was  that  he  only  plunged  himself  into  a  morass  of 
debt,  advances,  contracts  for  hack-work,  and  misery. 
*^  His  debts  rendered  him  at  times  so  melancholy  and  de- 
jected that  I  am  sure  he  felt  himself  a  very  unhappy 
man."  Perhaps  it  was  with  some  sudden  resolve  to  flee 
from  temptation,  and  grapple  with  the  difficulties  that  beset 
him,  that  he,  in  conjunction  with  another  Temple  neigh- 
bor, Mr.  Bott,  rented  a  cottage  some  eight  miles  down  the 
Edgware  road;  and  here  he  set  to  work  on  the  History  of 
Rome,  which  he  was  writing  for  Davies.  Apart  from  this 
hack-work,  now  rendered  necessary  by  his  debt,  it  is  prob- 
able that  one  strong  inducement  leading  him  to  this  occa- 
sional seclusion  was  the  progress  he  miglit  be  able  to  make 
with  the  Deserted  Village.  Amid  all  his  town  gayeties  and 
country  excursions,  amid  his  dinners  and  suppers  and 
dances,  his  borrowings,  and  contracts,  and  the  hurried 
literary  produce  of  the  moment,  he  never  forgot  what  was 
due  to  his  reputation  as  an  English  poet.  The  journalistic 
bullies  of  the  day  might  vent  their  spleen  and  envy  on  him; 
his  best  friends  might  smile  at  his  conversational  failures; 
the  wits  of  the  tavern  might  put  up  the  horse-collar  as  be- 
fore; but  at  least  he  had  the  consolation  of  his  art.  No 
one  better  knew  than  himself  the  value  of  those  finished 
and  musical  lines  ne  was  gradually  adding  to  the  beautiful 
poem,    the  grace,   and    sweetness,   and    tender,   pathetic 


O0LD8MITE  IN  SOCIETY.  89 

charm  of  which  make  it  one  of  the  literary  treasures  of  the 
English  people. 

The  sorrows  of  debt  were  not  Goldsmith's  only  trouble 
at  this  time.  For  some  reason  or  other  he  seems  to  have 
become  the  especial  object  of  spiteful  attack  on  the  part  of 
the  literary  cut-throats  of  the  day.  And  Goldsmith,  though 
he  might  listen  with  respect  to  the  wise  advice  of  Johnson 
on  such  matters,  was  never  able  to  cultivate  Johnson's  habit 
of  absolute  indifference  to  any  thing  that  might  be  said  or 
sung  of  him.  '*  The  Kenricks,  Campbells,  MacNicols, 
and  Hendersons,"  says  Lord  Macaulay — speaking  of  John- 
son, "did  their  best  to  annoy  him,  in  the  hope  that  he 
would  give  them  importance  by  answering  them.  But  the 
reader  will  in  vain  search  his  works  for  any  alUision  to 
Kenrick  or  Campbell,  to  MacNicol  or  Henderson.  One 
Scotchman,  bent  on  vindicating  the  fame  of  Scotch  learn- 
ing, defied  him  to  the  combat  in  a  detestable  Latin 
hexameter — 

"Maxime,  si  tu  vis,  cupio  contendere  tecum." 

But  Johnson  took  no  notice  of  the  challenge.  He  had 
learned,  both  from  his  own  observation  and  from  literary 
history,  in  which  he  was  deeply  read,  that  the  place  of 
books  in  the  public  estimation  is  fixed,  not  by  what  is 
written  about  them,  but  by  what  is  written  in  them;  and 
that  an  author  whose  works  are  likely  to  live  is  very  unwise 
if  he  stoops  to  wrangle  with  detractors  whose  works  are 
certain  to  die.  He  always  maintained  that  fame  was  a 
Bhuttlecock  which  could  be  kept  up  only  by  being  beaten 
back,  as  well  as  beaten  forward,  and  which  would  soon  fall 
if  there  were  only  one  battledore.  No  saying  was  of  tener 
in  his  mouth  than  that  fine  apothegm  of  Bentley,  that 
no  man  was  ever  written  down  but  by  himself." 

It  was  not  given  to  Goldsmith  to  feel  "like  the  Monu- 
ment "  on  any  occasion  whatsoever.  He  was  anxious  to 
have  the  esteem  of  his  friends;  he  was  sensitive  to  a  degree; 
denunciation  or  malice,  begotten  of  envy  that  Johnson 
would  have  passed  unheeded,  wounded  him  to  the  quick. 
"  The  insults  to  which  he  had  to  submit,"  Thackeray  wrote 
with  a  quick  and  warm  sympathy,  "are  shocking  to  read 
of — slander,  contumely,  vulgar  satire,  brutal  malignity 
perverting  his  commonest  motives  and  actions:  he  had  his 


90  LIFE  OF  O  OLD  SMITH. 

share  of  these,  and  one's  anger  is  roused  at  reading  of  them, 
as  it  is  at  seeing  a  woman  insulted  or  a  child  assaulted,  at 
the  notion  that  a  creature  so  very  gentle,  and  weak,  and 
full  of  love  should  have  had  to  suffer  so."  Goldsmith's 
revenge,  his  defence  of  himself,  his  appeal  to  the  public, 
were  the  Traveller,  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  the  Deserted 
Village;  but  these  came  at  long  intervals;  and  in  the 
meantime  he  had  to  bear  with  the  anonymous  malignity 
that  pursued  him  as  best  he  might.  No  doubt,  when 
Burke  was  entertaining  him  at  dinner,  and  when  Johnson 
was  openly  deferring  him  in  conversation  at  the  Club, 
and  when  Eeynolds  was  painting  his  portrait,  he  could 
afford  to  forget  Mr.  Kenrick  and  the  rest  of  the  libelling 
clan. 

The  occasions  on  which  Johnson  deferred  to  Goldsmith 
in  conversation  were  no  doubt  few;  but  at  all  events  the 
bludgeon  of  the  great  Cham  would  appear  to  have  come 
down  less  frequently  on  "  honest  Goldy  "  than  on  the  other 
members  of  that  famous  coterie.  It  could  come  down 
heavily  enough.  "  Sir,''  said  an  incautious  person, 
*'  drinking  drives  away  care,  and  makes  us  forget  whatever 
is  disagreeable.  Would  not  you  allow  a  man  to  drink  for 
that  reason?"  "Yes,  sir,"  was  the  reply,  "if  he  sat  next 
you."  Johnson,  however,  was  considerate  toward  Gold- 
smith, partly  because  of  his  affection  for  bim,  and  partly 
because  he  saw  under  what  disadvantages  Goldsmith  en- 
tered the  lists.  For  one  thing,  the  conversation  of  those 
evenings  would  seem  to  have  drifted  continually  into  the 
mere  definition  of  phrases.  Now  Johnson  had  spent  years 
of  his  life,  during  the  compilation  of  his  Dictionary,  in 
doing  nothing  else  but  defining;  and,  whenever  the  dispute 
took  a  phraseological  turn,  he  had  it  all  his  own  way. 
Goldsmith,  on  the  other  hand,  was  apt  to  become  confused 
in  his  eager  self-consciousness.  "  Goldsmith,"  said  John- 
son to  Boswell,  "  should  not  be  forever  attempting  to  shine 
in  conversation;  he  has  not  temper  for  it,  he  is  so  much 
mortified  when  he  fails.  .  .  .  When  he  contends,  if  he 
gets  the  better,  it  is  a  very  little  addition  to  a  man  of  his 
literary  reputation:  if  he  does  not  get  the  better,  he  is 
miserably  vexed."  Boswell,  nevertheless,  admits  that 
Goldsmith  was  "  often  very  fortunate  in  his  witty  contests, 
even  when  he  entered  the  lists  with  Johnson  himself/'  and 


GOLDSMITH  IN  SOCIETY.  91 

goes  on  to  tell  how  Goldsmith,  relating  the  fable  of  the 
little  fishes  who  petitioned  Jupiter,  and  perceiving  that 
Johnson  was  laughing  at  him,  immediately  said,  "  Why, 
Dr.  Johnson,  this  is  not  so  easy  as  you  seem  to  think;  for 
if  you  were  to  make  little  fishes  talk,  they  would  talk  like 
whales/'  Who  but  Groldsmith  would  have  dared  to  play 
jokes  on  the  sage?  At  supper  they  have  rumps  and  kid- 
neys. The  sage  expresses  his  approval  of  "  the  pretty  little 
things;"  but  profoundly  observes  that  one  must  eat  a  good 
many  of  them  before  being  satisfied.  "  Ay,  but  how  many 
of  them,"  asks  Goldsmith,  ''would  reach  to  the  moon?'' 
The  sage  professes  his  ignorance;  and,  indeed,  remarks 
that  that  would  exceed  even  Goldsmith's  calculations; 
when  the  practical  joker  observes,  *'  Why,  one,  sir,  if  it 
were  long  enough."  Johnson  was  completely  beaten  on 
this  occasion.  "  Well,  sir,  I  have  deserved  it.  I  should 
not  have  provoked  so  foolish  an  answer  by  so  foolish  a 
question." 

It  was  Johnson  himself,  moreover,  who  told  the  story  of 
Goldsmith  and  himself  being  in  Poets'  Corner;  of  his  say- 
ing to  Goldsmith, 

"  Forsitan  et  nostrum  nomen  miscebitur  istis," 

and  of  Goldsmith  subsequently  repeating  the  quotation 
when,  having  walked  toward  Fleet  Street,  they  were  con- 
fronted by  the  heads  on  Temple  Bar.  Even  when  Gold- 
smith was  opinionated  and  wrong,  Johnson's  contradiction 
was  in  a  manner  gentle.  ''If  you  put  a  tub  full  of  blood 
into  a  stable,  the  horses  are  like  to  go  mad,"  observed 
Goldsmith.  "  I  doubt  that,"  was  Johnson's  reply. 
"Nay,  sir,  it  is  a  fact  well  authenticated,"  Here  Thrale 
interposed  to  suggest  that  Goldsmith  should  have  the 
experiment  tried  in  the  stable;  but  Johnson  merely  said 
that,  if  Goldsmith  began  making  these  experiments,  he 
would  never  get  his  book  written  at  all.  Occasionally,  of 
course,  Goldsmith  was  tossed  and  gored  just  like  another. 
"  Bat,  sir,"  he  had  ventured  to  say,  in  opposition  to  John- 
son, "  when  people  live  together  who  have  something  as  to 
which  they  disagree,  and  which  they  want  to  shun,  tliey 
will  be  in  the  situation  mentioned  in  the  story  of  Blue- 
beard, '  You  may  look  into  all  the  chambers  but  one,' 
But  we  should  have  the  greatest  inclination  to  look  into 


92  LIFE  OF  00LD8MITE. 

that  chamber,  to  talk  of  that  subject."  Here,  according 
to  Boswell,  Johnson  answered  in  a  loud  voice,  "  Sir,  I  am 
not  saying  that  you  could  live  in  friendship  with  a  man 
from  whom  you  differ  as  to  one  point;  I  am  only  saying 
that  /  could  do  it."  But  then  again  he  could  easily 
obtain  pardon  from  the  gentle  Goldsmith  for  any  occasional 
rudeness.  One  evening  they  had  a  sharp  passage  of  arms 
at  dinner;  and  thereafter  the  company  adjourned  to  the 
Club,  where  Goldsmith  sat  silent  and  depressed.  "John- 
son perceived  this,"  says  Boswell,  "and  said  aside  to  some 
of  us,  '  rU  make  Goldsmith  forgive  me;'  and  then  called 
to  him  in  a  loud  voice,  '  Dr.  Goldsmith,  something  passed 
to-day  where  you  and  I  dined:  I  ask  your  pardon.'  Gold- 
smith answered  placidly,  '  It  must  be  much  from  you,  sir, 
that  I  take  ill.'  And  so  at  once  the  difference  was  over, 
and  they  were  on  as  easy  terms  as  ever,  and  Goldsmith 
rattled  away  as  usual."  For  the  rest,  Johnson  was  the 
constant  and  doughty  champion  of  Goldsmith  as  a  man  of 
letters.  He  would  suffer  no  one  to  doubt  the  power  and 
versatility  of  that  genius  which  he  had  been  among  the 
first  to  recognize  and  encourage. 

"  Whether,  indeed,  we  take  him  as  a  poet,  as  a  comic 
writer,  or  as  an  historian,"  he  announced  to  an  assemblage 
of  distinguished  persons  met  together  at  dinner  at  Mr. 
Beauclerc's,  "he  stands  in  the  first  class."  And  there  was 
no  one  living  who  dared  dispute  the  verdict — at  least  in 
Johnson's  hearing. 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  93 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

THE    DESERTED   VILLAGE. 

But  it  is  time  to  return  to  the  literary  performances 
that  gained  for  this  uncouth  Irisliman  so  great  an  amount 
of  consideration  from  the  first  men  of  his  time.  The 
engagement  with  GriflSn  about  tlie  History  of  Animated 
Nature  was  made  at  the  beginning  of  1769.  The  work 
was  to  occupy  eight  volumes;  and  Dr.  Goldsmith  was  to 
receive  eight  hundred  guineas  for  the  complete  copyright. 
Whether  the  undertaking  was  originally  a  suggestion  of 
Griffin's  or  of  Goldsmith's  own,  does  not  appear.  If  it  w^as 
the  author's,  it  was  probably  only  the  first  means  that 
occurred  to  him  of  getting  another  advance;  and  that 
advance — £500  on  account — he  did  actually  get.  But  if  it 
was  the  suggestion  of  the  publisher.  Griffin  must  have  been 
a  bold  man.  A  writer  whose  acquaintance  with  animated 
nature  was  such  as  to  allow  him  to  make  the  "  insidious 
tiger"  a  denizen  of  the  back  woods  of  Canada,*  was  not  a 
very  safe  authority.  But  perhaps  Griffin  had  consulted 
Johnson  before  making  this  bargain;  and  we  know  that 
Johnson,  though  continually  remarking  on  Goldsmith's 
extraordinary  ignorance  of  facts,  was  of  the  opinion  that 
the  History  of  Animated  Nature  would  be  "as  entertain- 
ing as  a  Persian  tale."  However,  Goldsmith — no  doubt 
after  he  had  spent  the  five  hundred  guineas — tackled  the 
work  in  earnest.  When  Boswell  subsequently  went  out  to 
call  on  him  at  another  rural  retreat  he  had  taken  on  the 
Edgwaro  Road,  Boswell  and  Mickle,  the  translator  of  the 
Lusiad,  found  Goldsmithat  home;  "but  having  a  curiosity 
to  see  his  apartment,  we  went  in  and  found  curious  scraps 
of  descriptions  of  animals  scrawled  upon  the  wall  with  a 
black    lead-pencil,"     Meanwhile,  this   Animated   Nature 

*  See  Citizen  of  the  World,  Letter  XVII. 


94  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

being  in  hand,  the  Roman  History  was  published,  and  was 
very  well  received  by  the  critics  and  by  the  public,  "  Gold- 
smith's abridgment,"  Johnson  declared,  "  is  better  than 
that  of  Lucius  Florus  or  Eutropius;  and  I  will  venture  to 
say  that  if  you  compare  him  with  Vertot,  in  the  same 
places  of  the  Roman  History,  you  will  find  that  he  excels 
Vertot.  Sir,  he  has  the  art  of  compiling,  and  of  saying 
everything  he  has  to  say  in  a  pleasing  manner/' 

So  thought  the  book-sellers  too;  and  the  success  of  the 
Roman  History  only  involved  him  in  fresh  projects  o-f 
compilation.  By  an  offer  of  £500  Davies  induced  him 
to  lay  aside  for  the  moment  the  Animated  Nature  and 
begin  "An  History  of  England,  from  the  Birth  of  the 
British  Empire  to  the  death  of  George  the  Second,  in 
four  volumes  octavo."  He  also  about  this  time  under- 
took to  write  a  Life  of  Thomas  Parnell.  Here,  indeed, 
was  plenty  of  work,  and  work  promising  good  pay;  but 
the  depressing  thing  is  that  Goldsmith  should  have  been 
the  man  who  had  to  do  it.  He  may  have  done  it  better 
than  any  one  else  could  have  done — indeed,  looking  over 
the  results  of  all  that  drudgery,  we  recognize  now  the  happy 
turns  of  expression  which  were  never  long  absent  from 
Goldsmith's  prose-writing — but  the  world  could  well  afford 
to  sacrifice  all  the  task-work  thus  got  through  for  another 
poem  like  the  Deserted  Village  or  the  Traveller.  Pei-haps 
Goldsmith  considered  he  was  making  a  fair  compromise 
when,  for  the  sake  of  his  reputation,  he  devoted  a  certain 
portion  of  his  time  to  his  poetical  work,  and  then,  to  have 
money  for  fine  clothes  and  high  jinks,  gave  the  rest  to  the 
book-sellers.  One  critic,  on  the  appearance  of  the  Roman 
History,  referred  to  the  Traveller,  and  remarked  that  it 
was  a  pity  that  the  "author  of  one  of  the  best  poems  that 
has  appeared  since  those  of  Mr.  Pope  should  not  apply 
wholly  to  works  of  imagination."  We  may  echo  that  regret 
now;  but  Goldsmith  Avould  at  the  time  have  no  doubt  re- 
plied that,  if  he  had  trusted  to  his  poems,  he  would  never 
have  been  able  to  pay  £400  for  chambers  in  the  Temple. 
In  fact  he  said  as  much  to  Lord  Lisburn  at  one  of  the 
Academy  dinners:  "  I  cannot  afford  to  court  the  draggle- 
tail  muses,  my  Lord;  they  would  let  me  starve;  but  by  my 
other  labors  I  can  make  shift  to  eat  and  drink,  and  have 
good  clothes."    And  there  is  little  use  in  our  regretting 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  95 

now  that  Goldsmith  was  not  cast  in  a  more  heroic  mold; 
we  have  to  take  him  as  he  is;  and  be  grateful  for  what  he 
has  left  us. 

It  is  a  grateful  relief  to  turn  from  these  book-sellers' 
contracts  and  forced  labors  to  the  sweet  clear  note  of  sing- 
ing that  one  finds  in  the  Deserted  Village.  This  poem, 
after  having  been  repeatedly  announced  and  as  often  with- 
drawn for  further  revision,  was  at  last  published  on  the 
26th  of  May,  1770,  when  Goldsmith  was  in  his  forty-second 
year.  The  leading  idea  of  it  he  had  already  thrown  out  in 
certain  lines  in  the  Traveller : 

"  Have  we  not  seen,  round  Britain's  peopled  shore, 
Her  useful  sons  exchanged  for  useless  ore  ? 
Seen  all  her  triumphs  but  destruction  haste, 
Like  flaring  tapers  brightening  as  they  waste  1 
Seen  opulence,  her  grandeur  to  maintain, 
Lead  stern  depopulation  in  her  train. 
And  over  fields  where  scattered  hamlets  rose 
In  barren  solitary  pomp  repose  ? 
Have  we  not  seen  at  pleasure's  lordly  call 
The  smiling  long- frequented  village  fall? 
Beheld  the  duteous  son,  the  sire  decayed. 
The  modest  matron,  and  the  blushing  maid, 
Forced  from  their  homes,  a  melancholy  train, 
To  traverse  climes  beyond  the  western  main; 
Where  wild  Oswego  spreads  her  swamps  around, 
And  Niagara  stuns  with  thundering  sound  ?" 

— and  elsewhere,  in  recorded  conversations  of  his,  we  find 
that  he  had  somehow  got  it  into  his  head  that  the  accumu- 
lation of  wealth  in  a  country  was  the  parent  of  all  evils, 
including  depopulation.  We  need  not  s<"-ay  here  to  discuss 
Goldsmith's  position  as  a  political  economist;  even  although 
Johnson  seems  to  sanction  his  theory  in  the  four  lines  he 
contributed  to  the  end  of  the  poem.  Nor  is  it  worth  while 
returning  to  that  objection  of  Lord  Macaulay's  which  has 
already  been  mentioned  in  these  pages,  further  than  to 
repeat  that  the  poor  Irish  village  in  which  Goldsmith  was 
brought  up  no  doubt  looked  to  him  as  charming  as  any 
Auburn,  when  he  regarded  it  through  the  softening  and 
beautifying  mist  of  years.  It  is  enough  that  the  abandon- 
ment by  a  number  of  poor  people  of  the  homes  in  wliich 
they  and  theirs  have  lived  their  lives  is  one  of  the  most 
pathetic  facts  in  our  civilization;  and  that  out  of  the  various 
circumstances  surrounding  this  forced  migration  Goldsmith 


96  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

has  made  one  of  the  most  graceful  and  touching  poems  in 
the  Enghsh  language.  It  is  clear  bird-singing;  but  there 
is  a  pathetic  note  in  it.  That  imaginary  ramble  through 
the  Lissoy  that  is  far  away  has  recalled  more  than  his  boy- 
ish sports;  it  has  made  him  look  back  over  his  own  life — 
the  life  of  an  exile. 

"  I  still  had  hopes,  my  latest  hours  to  crown, 
Amidst  these  humble  bowers  to  lay  me  down; 
To  husband  out  life's  taper  at  the  close, 
And  keep  the  flame  from  wasting  by  repose; 
I  still  had  hopes,  for  pride  attends  us  still. 
Amidst  the  swains  to  show  my  book  learned  skill. 
Around  my  fire  an  evening  group  to  draw. 
And  tell  of  all  I  felt,  and  all  I  saw; 
And,  as  a  hare  whom  hounds  and  horns  pursue 
Pants  to  the  place  from  whence  at  first  he  flew, 
I  still  had  hopes,  my  long  vexations  past. 
Here  to  return — and  die  at  home  at  last." 

Who  can  doubt  that  it  was  of  Lissoy  he  was  thinking?  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  writing  a  generation  ago,  said  that  ''  the 
church  which  tops  the  neighboring  hill,"  the  mill  and  the 
brook  were  still  to  be  seen  in  the  Irish  village:  and  that 
even 

"  The  hawthorn  bush  with  seats  beneath  the  shade, 
For  talking  age  and  whispering  lovers  made," 

had  been  identified  by  the  indefatigable  tourist,  and  was  of 
course  being  cut  to  pieces  to  make  souvenirs.  But  indeed 
it  is  of  little  consequence  whether  we  say  that  Auburn  is  an 
English  village,  or  insist  that  it  is  only  Lissoy  idealized,  as 
long  as  the  thing  is  true  in  itself.  And  we  know  that  this 
is  true:  it  is  not  that  one  sees  the  place  as  a  picture,  but 
that  one  seems  to  be  breathing  its  very  atmosphere,  and 
listening  to  the  various  cries  that  thrill  the  *'  hollow 
silence." 

"Sweet  was  the  sound,  wh«n  oft  at  evening's  close 
Up  yonder  hill  the  village  murmur  rose. 
There,  as  I  passed  with  careless  steps  and  slow. 
The  mingling  notes  came  softened  from  below; 
The  swain  responsive  as  the  milkmaid  sung. 
The  sober  herd  that  lowed  to  meet  their  young, 
The  noisy  geese  that  gabbled  o'er  the  pool. 
The  playful  children  just  let  loose  from  school, 
The  watch- dog's  voice  that  bayed  the  whispering  wind. 
And  the  loud  laugh  that  spake  the  vacant  mind." 


TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  97 

Nor  is  it  any  romantic  and  impossible  jDeasantiy  that  is 
gradually  brought  before  us.  There  are  no  Norvals  in 
Lissoy.  There  is  the  old  woman — Catherine  Geraghty, 
they  say,  was  her  name — who  gathered  cresses  in  the 
ditches  near  her  cabin.  There  is  the  village  preacher 
whom  Mrs.  Hodson,  Goldsmith's  sister,  took  to  be  a  por- 
trait of  their  father;  but  whom  others  have  identified  as 
Henry  Goldsmith,  and  even  as  the  uncle  Contarine:  they 
may  all  have  contributed.  And  then  comes  Paddy  Byrne. 
Amid  all  the  pensive  tenderness  of  the  poem  this  descrip- 
tion of  the  school-master,  with  its  strokes  of  demure 
humor,  is  introduced  with  delightful  effect: 

"  Beside  yon  straggling  fence  that  skirts  the  way. 
With  blossomed  furze  unprofitably  gay, 
There,  in  his  noisy  mansion,  skilled  to  rule, 
The  village  master  taught  his  little  school. 
A  man  severe  he  was,  and  stern  to  view; 
I  knew  him  well,  and  every  truant  knew: 
Well  had  the  boding  tremblers  learned  to  trace 
The  day's  disasters  in  his  morning  face; 
Full  well  they  laughed  with  counterfeited  glee 
At  all  his  jokes,  for  many  a  joke  had  he; 
Full  well  the  busy  whisper  circling  round 
Conveyed  the  dismal  tidings  when  he  frowned. 
Yet  he  was  kind,  or,  if  severe  in  aught, 
The  love  he  bore  to  learning  was  in  fault; 
The  village  all  declared  how  much  he  knew: 
'Twas  certain  he  could  write,  and  cipher  too: 
Lands  he  could  measure,  terms  and  tides  presage. 
And  e'en  the  story  ran  that  he  could  gauge: 
In  arguing,  too,  the  parson  owned  his  skill; 
For  e'en  though  vanquished,  he  could  argue  still; 
While  words  of  learned  length  and  thundering  sound 
Amazed  the  gazing  rustics  ranged  around; 
And  still  they  gazed,  and  still  the  wonder  grew 
That  one  small  head  could  carry  all  he  knew." 

All  this  is  so  simple  and  natural  that  we  cannot  fail  to 
believe  in  the  reality  of  Auburn,  or  Lissoy,  or  whatever  the 
village  may  be  supposed  to  be.  We  visit  the  clergyman's 
cheerful  fireside;  and  look  in  on  the  noisy  school;  and  sit 
in  the  evening  in  the  ale-house  to  listen  to  the  profound 
politics  talked  there.  But  the  crisis  comes.  Auburn  dc- 
lenda  est.  Here,  no  doubt,  occurs  tiie  least  probable  part 
of  the  poem.  Poverty  of  soil  is  a  common  cause  of  emi- 
gration; land  that  produces  oats  (when  it  can  produce  oats 


98  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

at  all)  three-fourths  mixed  with  weeds,  and  hay  chiefly 
consisting  of  rushes,  naturally  discharges  its  surplus  popu- 
lation as  families  increase;  and  though  the  wrench  of  part- 
ing is  painful  enough,  the  usual  result  is  a  change  from 
starvation  to  competence.  It  more  rarely  happens  that  a 
district  of  pe^ace  and  plenty,  such  as  Auburn  was  supposed 
to  see  around  it,  is  depopulated  to  add  to  a  great  man's 
estate. 

"  The  man  of  wealtli  and  pride 
Takes  up  a  space  that  many  poor  supplied; 
Space  for  liis  lake,  his  park's  extended  bounds. 
Space  for  his  horses,  equipage,  and  hounds: 

His  seat,  where  solitary  sports  are  seen. 
Indignant  spurns  the  cottage  from  the  green;" 

and  so  forth.  This  seldom  happens;  but  it  does  happen; 
and  it  has  happened,  in  our  day  in  England.  It  is  within 
the  last  twenty  years  that  an  English  landlord,  having 
faith  in  his  riches,  bade  a  village  be  removed  and  cast  else- 
where, so  that  it  should  no  longer  be  visible  from  his  win- 
dows: and  it  was  forthwith  removed.  But  any  solitary 
instance  like  this  is  not  sufficient  to  support  the  theory 
that  wealth  and  luxury  are  inimical  to  the  existence  of  a 
hardy  peasantry;  and  so  we  must  admit,  after  all,  that  it 
is  poetical  exigency  rather  than  political  economy  that  has 
decreed  the  destruction  of  the  loveliest  village  of  the  plain. 
Where,  asks  the  poet,  are  the  driven  poor  to  find  refuge, 
when  even  the  fenceless  commons  are  seized  upon  and  di- 
vided by  the  rich?    In  the  great  cities? — 

"  To  see  profusion  that  he  must  not  share; 
To  see  ten  thousand  baneful  arts  combined 
To  pamper  luxury  and  thin  mankind. " 

It  is  in  this  description  of  a  life  in  cities  that  there  occurs 
an  often  quoted  passage,  which  has  in  it  one  of  the  most 
perfect  lines  in  English  poetry: 

"  Ah!  turn  thine  eyes 
Where  the  poor  houseless  shivering  female  lies. 
She  once,  perhaps,  in  village  plenty  blest. 
Has  wept  at  tales  of  innocence  distrest; 
Her  modest  looks  the  cottage  might  adorn, 
Sweet  as  the  primrose  peeps  beneath  the  thorn; 
Now  lost  to  all;  her  friends,  her  virtue  fled. 


TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  99 

Near  her  betrayer's  door  she  lays  her  head. 

And,  pinched  with  cold,  and  shrinking  from  the  shower. 

With  heavy  heart  deplores  that  luckless  hour. 

When  idly  first,  ambitious  of  the  town. 

She  left  her  wheel  and  robes  of  country  brown." 

Goldsmith  wrote  in  a  pre-Wordsworthian  age,  when, 
even  in  the  realms  of  poetry,  a  primrose  was  not  much 
more  than  a  primrose;  but  it  is  doubtful  whether,  either 
before,  during,  or  since  Wordsworth's  time,  the  sentiment 
that  the  imagination  can  infuse  into  the  common  and  famil- 
iar things  around  us  ever  received  more  happy  expression 
than  in  the  well-known  line, 

"  Sweet  as  the  primrose  peeps  beneath  the  thorn." 

No  one  has  as  yet  succeeded  in  defining  accurately  and 
concisely  what  poetry  is;  but  at  all  events  this  line  is  sur- 
charged with  a  certain  quality  which  is  conspicuously  ab- 
Bent  in  such  a  production  as  the  Essay  on  Man.  Another 
similar  line  is  to  be  found  further  on  in  the  description  of 
the  distant  scenes  to  which  the  proscribed  people  are 
driven: 

"  Through  torrid  tracts  with  fainting  steps  they  go. 
Where  vyUd  Altama  murmurs  to  their  woe." 

Indeed,  the  pathetic  side  of  emigration  has  never  been  so 
powerfully  presented  to  us  as  in  this  poem: 

"  When  the  poor  exiles,  every  pleasure  past. 
Hung  round  the  bowers,  and  fondly  looked  their  last. 
And  took  a  long  farewell,  and  wished  in  vain 
For  seats  like  these  beyond  the  western  main, 
And  shuddering  still  to  face  the  distant  deep. 
Returned  and  wept,  and  still  returned  to  weep. 
******* 

Even  now,  methinks,  as  pondering  here  I  stand, 

I  see  the  rural  virtues  leave  the  land. 

Down  where  yon  anchoring  vessel  spreads  the  sail. 

That  idly  waiting  flaps  with  every  gale, 

Downward  they  move  a  melancholy  band, 

Pass  from  the  shore,  and  darken  all  the  strand. 

Contented  toil,  and  hospitable  care. 

And  kind  connubial  tenderness  are  there; 

And  piety  with  wishes  placed  above, 

And  steady  loyalty,  and  faithful  love." 


22— G  &  G— E 


100  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH, 

And  worst  of  all,  in  this  imaginative  departure,  we  find 
that  Poetry  herself  is  leaving  our  shores.  She  is  now  to 
try  her  voice: 

"  On  Torno's  cliffs  or  Pambamarca's  side;" 

and  the  poet,  in  the  closing  lines  of  the  poem,  bids  her  a 
passionate  and  tender  farewell: 

"  And  thou,  sweet  Poetry,  thou  loveliest  maid, 
Still  first  to  fly  where  sensual  joys  invade; 
Unfit  in  these  degenerate  times  of  shame 
To  catch  the  heart,  or  strike  for  honest  fame; 
Dear  charming  nymph,  neglected  and  decried, 
My  shame  in  crowds,  my  solitary  pride; 
Thou  source  of  all  my  bliss,  and  all  my  woe, 
That  found'st  me  poor  at  first,  and  keep'st  me  so; 
Thou  guide  by  which  the  nobler  arts  excel. 
Thou  nurse  of  every  virtue,  fare  thee  well! 
Farewell,  and  oh!  where'er  thy  voice  be  tried. 
On  Torno's  cliffs,  or  Pambamarca's  side. 
Whether  where  equinoctial  fervors  glow; 
Or  winter  wraps  the  polar  world  in  snow, 
Still  let  thy  voice,  prevailing  over  time. 
Redress  the  rigors  of  the  inclement  clime; 
Aid  slighted  truth  with  thy  persuasive  strain; 
Teach  erring  man  to  spurn  the  rage  of  gain; 
Teach  him,  that  states  of  native  strength  i>ossest. 
Though  very  poor,  may  still  be  very  blest; 
That  trade's  proud  empire  hastes  to  swift  decay, 
As  ocean  sweeps  the  labored  mole  away; 
While  self-dependent  power  can  time  defy, 
As  rocks  resist  the  billows  and  the  sky." 

Se  ends  this  graceful,  melodious  tender  poem,  the  posi- 
tion of  which  in  English  literature,  and  in  the  estimation 
of  all  who  love  English  literature,  has  not  been  disturbed 
by  any  fluctuations  of  literary  fashion.  We  may  give  more 
attention  at  the  moment  to  the  new  experiments  of  the 
poetic  method;  but  we  return  only  with  renewed  gratitude 
to  the  old  familiar  strain,  not  the  least  merit  of  which  is 
that  it  has  nothing  about  it  of  foreign  tricks  or  graces.  In 
English  literature  there  is  nothing  more  thoroughly  Eng- 
lish than  these  writings  produced  by  an  Irishman.  And 
whether  or  not  it  was  Paddy  Byrne,  and  Catharine  Ger- 
aghty,  and  the  Lissoy  ale-house  that  Goldsmith  had  in  his 
mind  when  he  was  writing  the  poem,  is  not  of  much  con- 
sequence: the  manner  and  language  and  feeling  are  all 


TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  101 

essentially  English;  so  that  we  never  think  of  calling 
Goldsmith  any  thing  but  an  English  poet. 

The  poem  met  with  great  and  immediate  success.  Of 
course  every  thing  that  Dr.  Goldsmith  now  wrote  was  read 
by  the  public;  he  had  not  to  wait  for  the  recommendation 
of  the  reviews;  but,  in  this  case,  even  the  reviews  had 
scarcely  any  thing  but  praise  in  the  welcome  of  his  new 
book.  It  was  dedicated,  in  graceful  and  ingenious  terms, 
to  Sir  Joshua  Keynolds,  who  returned  the  compliment  by 
painting  a  picture  and  placing  on  the  engraving  of  it  this 
inscription:  "  This  attempt  to  express  a  character  in  the 
Deserted  Village  is  dedicated  to  Dr.  Goldsmith  by  his  sincere 
friend  and  admirer,  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds."  What  Gold- 
smith got  from  Griffin  for  the  poem  is  not  accurately 
known;  and  this  is  a  misfortune,  for  the  knowledge  would 
have  enabled  us  to  judge  whether  at  that  time  it  was  possible 
for  a  poet  to  court  the  draggle-tail  muses  without  risk  of 
starvation.  But  if  fame  were  his  chief  object  in  the  com- 
position of  the  poem,  he  was  sufficiently  rewarded;  and  it 
18  to  be  surmised  that  by  this  time  the  people  in  Ireland — 
no  longer  implored  to  get  subscribers — had  heard  of  the 
proud  position  won  by  the  vagrant  youth  who  had  "taken 
the  world  for  his  pillow  "  some  eighteen  years  before. 

That  his  own  thoughts  had  sometimes  wandered  back  to 
the  scenes  and  friends  of  his  youth  during  this  labor  of 
love,  we  know  from  his  letters.  In  January  of  this  year, 
while  as  yet  theDeserted  Village  was  not  quite  through  the 
press,  he  wrote  to  his  brother  Maurice,  and  expressed  him- 
self as  most  anxious  to  hear  all  about  the  relatives  from 
whom  he  had  been  so  long  parted.  He  has  something  to 
say  about  himself  too;  wishes  it  to  be  known  that  the  King 
has  lately  been  pleased  to  make  him  Professor  of  Ancient 
History  "  in  a  Royal  Academy  of  Painting  which  he  had 

i'ust  established;"  but  gives  no  very  flourishing  account  of 
lis  circumstances.  *'  Honors  to  one  in  my  situation  are 
something  like  ruffles  to  a  man  that  wants  a  shirt."  How- 
ever, there  is  some  small  legacy  of  fourteen  or  fifteen 
pounds  left  him  by  his  uncle  Contarine,  which  he  under- 
stands to  be  in  keeping  of  his  cousin  Lawder;  and  to  this 
wealth  he  is  desirous  of  foregoing  all  claim:  his  relations 
must  settle  how  it  may  be  best  expended.  But  there  is 
not  a  reference  to  his  literary  achievements,  or  the  position 


103  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

won  by  them;  not  the  slightest  yielding  to  even  a  pardon- 
able vanity;  it  is  a  modest,  affectionate  letter.  The  only 
hint  that  Maurice  Goldsmith  receives  of  the  esteem  in 
which  his  brother  is  held  in  London,  is  contained  in  a 
brief  mention  of  Johnson,  Burke  and  others,  as  his 
friends.  "  I  have  sent  my  cousin  Jenny  a  miniature  pict- 
ure of  myself,  as  I  believe  it  is  the  most  acceptable  present 
I  can  offer.  I  have  ordered  it  to  be  left  for  her  at  George 
Faulkenors,  folded  in  a  letter.  The  face,  you  well  know, 
is  ugly  enough;  but  it  is  finely  painted.  I  will  shortly 
also  send  my  friends  over  the  Shannon  some  mezzotint 
prints  of  myself,  and  some  more  of  my  friends  here,  such  as 
Burke,  Johnson,  Reynolds  and  Colman.  I  believe  I  have 
written  an  hundred  letters  to  different  friends  in  your  coun- 
try, and  never  received  an  answer  from  any  of  them.  I 
do  not  know  how  to  account  for  this,  or  why  they  are  un- 
willing to  keep  up  for  me  those  regards  which  I  must  ever 
retain  for  them,"  The  letter  winds  up  with  an  appeal  for 
news,  news,  news. 


OGQASIONAL  WmTINQ8»  103 


CHAPTER    XV. 

0CCASI02S-AL    WRITINGS. 

Some  two  months  after  the  publication  of  the  Deserted 
Village,  when  its  success  had  been  well  assured,  Goldsmith 
proposed  to  himself  the  relaxation  of  a  little  Continental 
tour;  and  he  was  accompanied  by  three  ladies,  Mrs.  Hor- 
neck  and  her  two  pretty  daughters,  who  doubtless  took 
more  charge  of  him  than  he  did  of  them.  This  Mrs.  Hor- 
neck,  the  widow  of  a  certain  Captain  Horneck,  was  con- 
nected with  Reynolds,  while  Burke  was  the  guardian  of  the 
two  girls;  so  that  it  was  natural  that  they  should  make  the 
acquaintance  of  Dr.  Goldsmith.  A  foolish  attempt  has 
been  made  to  weave  out  of  the  relations  supposed  to  exist 
between  the  younger  of  the  girls  and  Goldsmith  an  imagi- 
nary romance;  but  there  is  not  the  slightest  actual  founda- 
tion for  any  thing  of  the  kind.  Indeed  the  best  guide  we 
can  have  to  the  friendly  and  familiar  terms  on  which  he 
stood  with  regard  to  the  Hornecks  and  their  circle,  is  the 
following  careless  and  jocular  reply  to  a  chance  invitation 
sent  him  by  the  two  sisters: 

"  Your  mandate  I  got, 
You  may  all  go  to  pot: 
Had  your  senses  been  right, 
You'd  have  sent  before  night; 
As  I  hope  to  be  saved, 
I  put  off  being  shaved; 
For  I  could  not  make  bold, 
While  the  matter  was  cold. 
To  meddle  in  suds. 
Or  to  put  on  my  duds; 
So  tell  Horneck  and  Nesbitt 
And  Baker  and  his  bit, 
And  Kauffinan  beside, 
And  the  Jessamy  bride; 
With  the  rest  of  the  crew. 
The  Reynoldses  two. 


104  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Little  Comedy's  face 
And  the  Captain  in  lace. 

m  *  *  * 

Yet  how  can  I  when  vext 

Thus  stray  from  my  text  ? 

Tell  each  other  to  rue 

Your  Devonshire  crew. 

For  sending  so  late 

To  one  of  my  state. 

But  'tis  Reynold's  way 

From  wisdom  to  stray, 

And  Angelica's  whim 

To  be  frolic  like  him. 
But,  alas!  your  good  worships,  how  could  they  be  wiser, 
When  both  have  been  spoiled  in  to-day's  Advertiser?  " 

"The  Jessamy  Bride"  was  the  pet  nickname  he  had 
bestowed  on  the  younger  Miss  Horneck — the  heroine  of 
the  speculative  romance  just  mentioned;  ''  Little  Comedy" 
was  her  sister;  "the  Captain  in  lace"  their  brother, 
who  was  in  the  Guards.  No  doubt  Mrs.  Eorneck  and 
her  daughters  were  very  pleased  to  have  with  them  on 
this  Continental  trip  so  distinguished  a  person  as  Dr. 
Goldsmith;  and  he  must  have  been  very  ungrateful  if  he 
was  not  glad  to  be  provided  with  such  charming  compan- 
ions. The  story  of  the  sudden  envy  he  displayed  of  the 
admiration  excited  by  the  two  handsome  young  English- 
women as  they  stood  at  a  hotel  window  in  Lille,  is  so 
incredibly  foolish  that  it  needs  scarcely  be  repeated  here; 
unless  to  repeat  the  warning  that,  if  ever  anybody  was  so 
dense  as  not  to  see  the  humor  of  that  piece  of  acting,  one 
had  better  look  with  grave  suspicion  on  every  one  of  the 
stories  told  about  Goldsmith's  vanities  and  absurdities. 

Even  with  such  pleasant  companions,  the  trip  to  Paris 
was  not  every  thing  he  had  hoped.  "  I  find,"  he  wrote 
to  Reynolds  from  Paris,  "  that  traveling  at  twenty  and 
at  forty  are  very  different  things.  I  set  out  with  all  my 
confirmed  habits  about  me,  and  can  find  nothing  on  the 
Continent  so  good  as  when  I  formerly  left  it.  One  of 
our  chief  amusements  here  is  scolding  at  every  thing  we 
meet  with,  and  praising  eveiy  thing  and  every  person  we 
left  at  home.  You  may  judge  therefore  whether  your 
name  is  not  frequently  bandied  at  table  among  us.  To 
tell  you  the  truth,  I  never  thought  I  could  regret  your 
absence  so  much,   as   our   various   mortifications   on   the 


OCCASIONAL  WRITINGS.  105 

road  have  often  taught  me  to  do.  I  could  tell  you  of 
disasters  and  adventures  without  number,  of  our  lying  in 
barns,  and  of  my  being  half  poisoned  with  a  dish  of 
green  peas,  of  our  quarreling  with  postilions  and  being 
cheated  by  our  landladies,  but  I  reserve  all  this  for  a 
happy  hour  which  I  expect  to  share  with  you  upon  my 
return."  The  fact  is  that  although  Goldsmith  had  seen 
a  good  deal  of  foreign  travel,  the  manner  of  his  making 
the  grand  tour  in  his  youth  was  not  such  as  to  fit  him  for 
acting  as  courier  to  a  party  of  ladies.  However,  if  they 
increased  his  troubles,  they  also  shared  them;  and  in 
this  same  letter  he  bears  explicit  testimony  to  the  value 
of  their  companionship.  "I  will  soon  be  among  you, 
better  pleased  with  my  situation  at  home  than  I  ever  was 
before.  And  yet  I  must  say,  that  if  anything  could  make 
France  pleasant,  the  very  good  women  with  whom  I  am 
at  present  would  certainly  do  it.  I  could  say  more  about 
that,  but  I  intend  showing  them  this  letter  before  I  send  it 
away."  Mrs.  Horneck,  Little  Comedy,  the  Jessamy  Bride, 
and  the  Professor  of  Ancient  History  at  the  Royal  Academy, 
all  returned  to  London;  the  last  to  resume  his  round  of 
convivialities  at  taverns,  excursions  into  regions  of  more 
fashionable  amusement  along  with  Reynolds,  and  task-work 
aimed  at  the  pockets  of  the  book-sellers. 

It  was  a  happy-go-lucky  sort  of  life.  We  find  him  now 
showing  off  his  fine  clothes  and  his  sword  and  wig  at  Rane- 
lagh  Gardens,  and  again  shut  up  in  his  chambers  compil- 
ing memoirs  and  histories  in  hot  haste;  now  the  guest  of 
Lord  Clare,  and  figuring  at  Bath,  and  again  delighting 
some  small  domestic  circle  by  his  quips  and  cranks;  playing 
jokes  for  the  amusement  of  children,  and  writing  comic 
letters  in  verse  to  their  elders;  everywhere  and  at  all  times 
merry,  thoughtless,  good-natured.  And,  of  course,  we 
find  also  his  humorous  pleasantries  being  mistaken  for 
blundering  stupidity.  In  perfect  good  faith  Boswell  de- 
ficribcs  how  a  number  of  people  burst  out  laughing  when 
Goldsmith  publicly  complained  that  he  had  met  Lord 
Camden  at  Lord  Clare's  house  in  the  country,  "  and  he 
took  no  more  notice  of  me  than  if  I  had  been  an  ordinary 
man."  Goldsmith's  claiming  to  be  a  very  extraordinary 
person  was  precisely  a  stroke  of  that  humorous  cielf-depre- 
ciation  in  which  he  was  continually  indulging;  and  tho 


106  LIFE  OF  Q0LD8MITE. 

Jessamy  Bride  has  left  it  on  record  that  **oii  many  occa- 
sions, from  the  peculiar  manner  of  his  humor,  and  assumed 
frown  of  countenance,  what  was  often  uttered  in  jest  was 
mistaken  by  those  who  did  not  know  him  for  earnest/' 
This  would  appear  to  have  been  one  of  those  occasions. 
The  company  burst  out  laughing  at  Goldsmith's  having 
made  a  fool  of  himself;  and  Johnson  was  compelled  to 
come  to  his  rescue.  "  Nay,  gentlemen.  Dr.  Goldsmith  is 
in  the  right.  A  nobleman  ought  to  have  made  up  to  such 
a  man  as  Goldsmith;  and  I  think  it  is  much  against  Lord 
Camden  that  he  neglected  him." 

Mention  of  Lord  Clare  naturally  recalls  the  Haunch  of 
Venison.  Goldsmith  was  particularly  happy  in  writing 
bright  and  airy  verses;  the  grace  and  lightness  of  his 
touch  has  rarely  been  approached.  It  must  be  confessed, 
however,  that  in  this  direction  he  was  somewhat  of  an 
Autolycus;  unconsidered  trifles  he  freely  appropriated;  but 
he  committed  these  thefts  with  scarcely  any  concealment, 
and  with  the  most  charming  air  in  the  world.  In  fact 
some  of  the  snatches  of  verse  which  he  contributed  to  the 
Bee  scarcely  profess  to  be  any  thing  else  than  translation, 
though  the  originals  are  not  given.  But  who  is  likely  to 
complain  when  we  get  as  the  result  such  a  delightful  piece 
of  nonsense  as  the  famous  Elegy  on  that  Glory  of  her  Sex, 
Mrs.  Mary  Blaize,  which  has  been  the  parent  of  a  vast  pro- 
geny since  Goldsmith's  time? 

"  Good  people  all,  with  one  accord 
Lament  for  Madam  Blaize, 
Who  never  wanted  a  good  word 
From  those  who  spoke  her  praise. 

*'  The  needy  seldom  passed  her  door, 
And  always  found  her  kind; 
She  freely  lent  to  all  the  poor — 
Who  left  a  pledge  behind. 

**  She  strove  the  neighborhood  to  please, 
With  manners  wondrous  winning; 
And  never  followed  wicked  ways — 
Unless  when  she  was  sinning. 

**  At  church,  in  silks  and  satins  new. 
With  hoop  of  monstrous  size, 
She  never  slumbered  in  her  pew— 
But  when  she  shut  her  eyes. 


OCCASIONAL  WRITINGS.  107 

'  Her  love  was  sought,  I  do  aver, 
By  twenty  beaux  and  more; 
The  king  himself  has  followed  her — • 
When  she  has  walked  before. 

**  But  now  her  wealth  and  finery  fled, 
Her  hangers-on  cut  short  all; 
The  doctors  found,  when  she  was  dead— 
Her  last  disorder  mortal. 

"  Let  us  lament,  in  sorrow  sore. 
For  Kent  Street  well  may  say. 
That  had  she  lived  a  twelvemonth  more — 
She  had  not  died  to-day." 

The  Haunch  oj  Venison,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  poetical 
letter  of  thanks  to  Lord  Clare — an  easy,  jocular  epistle,  in 
which  the  writer  has  a  cut  or  two  at  certain  of  his  literary 
brethren.  Then,  as  he  is  looking  at  the  venison,  and  de- 
termining not  to  send  it  to  any  such  people  as  Hiffernan 
or  Higgins,  who  should  step  in  but  our  old  friend  Beau 
Tibbs,  or  some  one  remarkably  like  him  in  manner  and 
speech  ? — 

"  While  thus  I  debated,  in  reverie  centred, 
An  acquaintance,  a  friend  as  he  called  himself,  entered; 
An  under- bred,  fine  spoken  fellow  was  he. 
And  he  smiled  as  he  looked  at  the  venison  and  me. 
'  What  have  we  got  here? — Why  this  is  good  eating! 
Your  own,  I  suppose — or  is  it  in  waiting  ?' 
'  Why,  whose  should  it  be?'  cried  I  with  a  flounce; 
'  I  get  these  things  often  ' — but  that  was  a  bounce; 
'  Some  lords,  my  acquaintance,  that  settle  the  nation. 
Are  pleased  to  be  kind — but  I  hate  ostentation.' 
'  If  that  be  the  case  then,'  he  cried,  very  gay, 
'  I'm  glad  I  have  taken  this  house  in  my  way, 
To-morrow  you  take  a  poor  dinner  with  me; 
No  words — I  insist  on't — precisely  at  three; 
We'll  have  Johnson,  and  Burke;  all  the  wits  will  be  there; 
My  acquaintance  is  sliglit,  or  I'd  ask  my  Lord  Clare. 
And  now  tliat  I  think  on't,  as  I  am  a  sinner? 
We  wanted  this  venison  to  make  out  the  dinner. 
What  say  you — a  pasty  ?     It  shall,  and  it  must. 
And  my  wife,  little  Kitty,  is  famous  for  crust. 
Here,  porter!  this  venison  with  me  to  Mile  End; 
No  stirring — I  beg — my  dear  friend — my  dear  friend  I' 
Thus,  snatching  his  hat,  he  brushed  off  like  the  wind, 
And  the  porter  and  eatables  followed  behind." 

We  need  not  follow  the  vanished  venison — which  did  not 


108  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

make  its  appearance  at  the  banquet  any  more  than  did 
Johnson  or  Burke — furtlier  than  to  say  that  if  Lord  Clare 
did  not  make  it  good  to  the  poet  he  did  not  deserve  to  have 
his  name  associated  with  such  a  clever  and  careless  jeu 
d'esprit. 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER,,  lOf 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

8HE  STOOPS  TO   COISTQUER. 

But  the  writing  of  smart  verses  could  not  keep  Dr.  Gold- 
smith alive,  more  especially  as  dinner-parties,  Rauelagh 
masquerades,  and  similar  diversions  pressed  heavily  on  his 
finances.  When  his  History  of  England  appeared,  the 
literary  cut-throats  of  the  day  accused  him  of  having  been 
bribed  by  the  Government  to  betray  the  liberties  of  the 
people:*  a  foolish  charge.  What  Goldsmith  got  for  the 
English  History  was  the  sum  originally  stipulated  for,  and 
now,  no  doubt,  all  spent;  with  a  further  sum  of  fifty 
guineas  for  an  abridgment  of  the  work.  Then,  by  this  time, 
he  had  persuaded  Griffin  to  advance  him  the  whole  of  the 
eight  hundred  guineas  for  the  Animated  Nature,  though 
he  had  only  done  about  a  third  part  of  the  book.  At  the 
instigation  of  Newbery  he  had  begun  a  story  after  the 
manner  of  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield;  but  it  appears  that 
such  chapters  as  he  had  written  were  not  deemed  to  be 
promising,  and  the  undertaking  was  abandoned.  The 
fact  is,  Goldsmith  was  now  thinking  of  another  method  of 
replenishing  his  purse.  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield  had 
brought  him  little  but  reputation;  the  Good-natured  Man 
had  brought  him  £500.  It  was  to  the  stage  that  he  now 
looked  for  assistance  out  of  the  financial  slough  in  which 
he  was  plunged.  He  was  engaged  in  writing  a  comedy  ; 
and  that  comedy  was  She  Stoojys  to  Conquer. 

In  the  Dedication  to  Johnson  which  was  prefixed  to  this 
play  on  its  appearance  in  type.  Goldsmith  hints  that  the 
attempt  to  write  a  comedy  not  of  the  sentimental  order 
then  in  fashion,  was  a  hazardous  thing  ;  and  also  that  Col- 

*  "  God  knows  I  had  no  thought  for  or  against  liberty  in  my 
head;  my  whole  aim  being  to  make  up  a  book  of  a  decent  size  that, 
as  Squire  Richard  says,  '  would  do  no  harm  to  nobody.'  " — Goldsmith. 
to  Langton,  Sept<3mber,  1771. 


110  LIFE  OF  Q0LD8MITE. 

man,  who  saw  the  piece  in  its  various  stages,  was  of  this 
opinion,  too.  Colman  threw  cold  water  on.  the  under- 
taking from  the  very  beginning.  It  was  only  extreme 
pressure  on  the  part  of  Goldsmith's  friends  that  induced — 
or  rather  compelled — him  to  accept  the  comedy  ;  and  that, 
after  he  had  kept  the  unfortunate  author  in  the  tortures  of 
suspense  for  month  after  month.  But  although  Goldsmith 
knew  the  danger,  he  was  resolved  to  face  it.  He  hated  the 
sentimentalists  and  all  their  works  ;  and  determined  to 
keep  his  new  comedy  faithful  to  nature,  whether  people 
called  it  low  or  not.  His  object  was  to  raise  a  genuine, 
hearty  laugh  ;  not  to  write  a  piece  for  school  declamation  ; 
and  he  had  enough  confidence  in  himself  to  do  the  work  in 
his  own  way.  Moreover  he  took  the  earliest  possible  oppor- 
tunity, in  writing  this  piece,  of  poking  fun  at  the  sensitive 
creatures  who  had  been  shocked  by  the  "vulgarity"  of 
The  Oood-natured  Man.  "Bravo!  Bravo  !"  cry  the  jolly 
companions  of  Tony  Lumpkin,  when  that  promising 
buckeen  has  finished  his  song  at  the  Three  Pigeons  ;  then 
follows  criticism  : 

"  First  Fellow.  The  squire  has  got  spunk  in  him. 

"Second  Fel.  I  loves  to  hear  him  sing,  bekeays  he  never  gives  UB 
nothing  that's  low. 

"  Third  Fel.  O  damn  any  thing  that's  low,  I  cannot  bear  it. 

"  Fourth  Fel.  The  genteel  thing  is  the  genteel  thing  any  time:  if 
60  be  that  a  gentleman  bees  in  a  concatenation  accordingly. 

"  Third  Fel.  I  likes  the  maxum  of  it,  Master  Muggins.  What, 
though  I  am  obligated  to  dance  a  bear,  a  man  may  be  a  gentleman 
for  all  that.  May  this  be  my  poison,  if  my  bear  ever  dances  but  to 
the  very  genteelest  of  tunes;  '  Water  Parted,'  or  the  '  The  Minuet  in 
Ariadne. ' " 

Indeed,  Goldsmith,  however  he  might  figure  in  society, 
was  always  capable  of  holding  his  own  when  he  had  his 
pen  in  his  hand.  And  even  at  the  outset  of  this  comedy 
one  sees  how  much  he  has  gained  in  literary  confidence 
since  the  writing  of  the  Good-natured  Man.  Here  there 
is  no  anxious  stiffness  at  all;  but  a  brisk,  free  conversation, 
full  of  point  that  is  not  too  formal,  and  yet  conveying  all 
the  information  that  has  usually  to  be  crammed  into  a  first 
scene.  In  taking  as  the  groundwork  of  his  plot  that  old 
adventure  that  had  befallen  himself — his  mistaking  a 
squire's  house  for  an  inn — he  was  hampering  himself  with 
something  that  was  not  the  less  improbable  because  it  had 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  m 

actually  happened;  but  we  begin  to  forget  all  the  improb- 
abilities through  the  naturalness  of  the  people  to  whom  we 
are  introduced,  and  the  brisk  movement  and  life  of  the 
piece. 

Fashions  in  dramatic  literature  may  come  and  go;  but 
the  wholesome  good-natured  fun  of  She  Stoops  to  Conquer 
Is  as  capable  of  producing  a  hearty  laugh  now  as  it  was  when 
it  first  saw  the  light  in  Covent  Garden.  Tony  Lumpkin  is 
one  of  the  especial  favorites  of  the  theater-going  public; 
and  no  wonder.  With  all  the  young  cub's  jibes  and  jeers, 
his  impudence  and  grimaces,  one  has  a  sneaking  love  for 
the  scapegrace;  we  laugh  with  him,  rather  than  at  him;- 
how  can  we  fail  to  enjoy  those  malevolent  tricks  of  his 
when  he  so  obviously  enjoys  them  himself?  And  Diggory 
— do  we  not  owe  an  eternal  debt  of  gratitude  to  honest 
Diggory  for  telling  us  about  Ould  Grouse  in  the  gun-room, 
that  immortal  joke  at  which  thousands  and  thousands  of 
people  have  roared  with  laughter,  though  they  never  any 
one  of  them  could  tell  what  the  story  was  about?  The 
scene  in  which  the  old  squire  lectures  his  faithful  attend- 
ants on  their  manners  and  duties,  is  one  of  the  truest  bits 
of  comedy  on  the  English  stage: 

"Mr.  Hardcastle.  But  you're  not  to  stand  so,  with  your  hands  in 
your  pockets.  Take  your  hands  from  your  pockets,  Roger;  and  from 
your  head,  you  blockhead  you.  See  how  Diggory  carries  his  hands. 
They're  a  little  too  stiff,  indeed,  but  that's  no  great  matter. 

"Diggory.  Ay,  mind  how  I  hold  them.  I  learned  to  hold  my 
iands  this  way  when  I  was  upon  drill  for  the  militia.  And  so  being 
upon  drill 

"  Uwrd.  You  must  not  be  so  talkative,  Diggory.  You  must  be  all 
attention  to  the  guests.  You  must  hear  us  talk,  and  not  think  of 
talking;  you  must  see  us  drink,  and  not  think  of  drinking;  you  must 
Bee  us  eat,  and  not  think  of  eating. 

'*  Dig.  By  the  laws,  your  worship,  that's  perfectly  unpossible. 
Whenever  Diggory  sees  yeating  going  forward,  ecod,  he's  always 
wishing  for  a  mouthful  himself. 

"  Hard.  Blockhead!  Is  not  a  bellyful  ii  the  kitchen  as  good  as  a 
bellyful  in  the  parlor  ?     Stay  your  stomach  with  that  reflection. 

"Dig.  Ecod,  I  thank  your  worship,  I'll  make  a  shift  to  stay  my 
stomach  with  a  slice  of  cold  beef  in  the  pantry. 

"'  Hard.  Diggory,  you  are  too  talkative.  Then,  if  I  happen  to  say 
a  good  thing,  or  tell  a  good  story  at  table,  you  must  not  all  burst  out 
a-laughing,  as  if  you  made  pan  of  the  company. 

"  Dig.  Then  ecod  your  worship  must  not  tell  the  story  of  Ould 
Grouse  in  the  gun-room;  I  can't  helplaughingat  that— hel  hel  hel— 


112  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

for  the  soul  of  me.     We  have  laughed  at  that  these  twenty  years— 
ha!  ha!  ha! 

"  Hard.  Ha!  ha!  ha!  The  story  is  a  good  one.  Well,  honest  Dig- 
gory,  you  may  laugh  at  that — but  still  remember  to  be  attentive. 
Suppose  one  of  the  company  should  call  for  a  glass  of  wine,  how  will 
you  behave?  A  glass  of  wine,  sir,  if  you  please  {to  Diggory). — Eh, 
why  don't  you  move  ? 

"  Dig.  Ecod,  your  worship,  I  never  have  courage  till  I  see  the 
eatables  and  drinkables  brought  upo'  the  table,  and  then  I'm  as 
bauld  as  a  lion. 

"  Hard.  What,  will  nobody  move  ? 

'*  First  Serv.  I'm  not  to  leave  this  pleace. 

"  Second  Serv.  I'm  sure  it's  no  pleace  of  mine. 
I     "  Third  Serv.  Nor  mine,  for  sartain. 

"  Dig.  Wauns,  and  I'm  sure  it  canna  be  mine." 

No  doubt  all  this  is  very  "low"  indeed;  and  perhaps 
Mr.  Colmau  may  be  forgiven  for  suspecting  that  the  refined 
wits  of  the  day  would  be  shocked  by  these  rude  humors  of 
a  parcel  of  servants.  But  all  that  can  be  said  in  this  direc- 
tion was  said  at  the  time  by  Horace  Walpole,  in  a  letter  to 
a  friend  of  his;  and  this  criticism  is  so  amusing  in  its  pre- 
tence and  imbecility  that  it  is  worth  quoting  at  large. 
"  Dr.  Goldsmith  has  written  a  comedy/^  says  this  profound 
critic,  '' — no,  it  is  the  lowest  of  all  farces;  it  is  not  the  sub- 
ject I  condemn,  though  very  vulgar,  but  the  execution. 
The  drift  tends  to  no  moral,  no  edification  of  any  kind — 
the  situations,  however,  are  well  imagined,  and  make  one 
laugh  in  spite  of  the  grossness  of  the  dialogue,  the  forced 
witticisms,  and  total  improbability  of  the  whole  plan  and 
conduct.  But  what  disgusts  me  most  is,  that  though  the 
characters  are  very  low,  and  aim  at  low  humor,  not  one  of 
them  says  a  sentence  that  is  natural,  or  marks  any  charac- 
ter at  all."  Horace  Walpole  sighing  for  edification — from 
a  Co  vent  Garden  comedy!  Surely,  if  the  old  gods  have 
any  laughter  left,  and  if  they  take  any  notice  of  what  is 
done  in  the  literary  world  here  below,  there  must  have 
rumbled  through  the  courts  of  Olympus  a  guft'aw  of  sar- 
donic laughter  when  that  solemn  criticism  was  put  down 
on  paper. 

Meanwhile  Colman's  original  fears  had  developed  into  a 
sort  of  stupid  obstinacy.  He  was  so  convinced  that  the 
play  would  not  succeed,  that  he  would  spend  no  money  in 
putting  it  on  the  stage;  while  far  and  wide  he  announced 
its  failure  as  a  foregone  conclusion.     Under  this  doom  of 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  ng 

vaticination  the  rehearsals  were  nevertheless  proceeded 
with — the  brunt  of  the  quarrels  among  the  players  failing 
wholly  on  Goldsmith,  for  the  manager  seems  to  have  with- 
drawn in  despair;  while  all  the  Johnson  confraternity  were 
determined  to  do  what  they  could  for  Goldsmith  on  the 
opening  night.  That  was  the  15th  of  March,  1773.  His 
friends  invited  the  author  to  dinner  as  a  prelude  to  the 
play;  Dr.  Johnson  was  in  the  chair;  there  was  plenty  of 
gayety.  But  this  means  of  keeping  up  the  anxious  author's 
spirits  was  not  very  successful.  Goldsmith's  mouth,  we 
are  told  by  Eeynolds,  became  so  parched  ''from  the  agita- 
tion of  his  mind,  that  he  was  unable  to  swallow  a  single 
mouthful."  Moreover,  he  could  not  face  the  ordeal  of  sit- 
ting through  the  play;  when  his  friends  left  the  tavern  and 
betook  themselves  to  the  theater,  he  went  away  by  himself; 
and  was  subsequently  found  walking  in  St.  James'  Park. 
The  friend  who  discovered  him  there  persuaded  him  that 
his  presence  in  the  theater  might  be  useful  in  case  of  an 
emergency;  and  ultimately  got  him  to  accompany  him  to 
Covent  Garden.  When  Goldsmith  reached  the  theater  the 
fifth  act  had  been  begun. 

Oddly  enough,  the  first  thing  he  heard  on  entering  the 
stage-door  was  a  hiss.  The  story  goes  that  the  poor  author 
was  dreadfully  frightened;  and  that  in  answer  to  a  hurried 
question,  Colman  exclaimed,  ''Pshaw!  Doctor,  don't  be 
afraid  of  a  squib,  when  we  have  been  sitting  these  two 
hours  on  a  barrel  of  gunpowder."  If  this  was  meant  as  a 
hoax,  it  was  a  cruel  one;  if  meant  seriously,  it  was  untrue. 
For  the  piece  had  turned  out  a  great  hit.  From  beginning 
to  end  of  the  performance  the  audience  were  in  a  roar  of 
laughter;  and  the  single  hiss  that  Goldsmith  unluckily 
heard  was  so  markedly  exceptional,  that  it  became  the  talk 
of  the  town,  and  was  variously  attributed  to  one  or  other 
of  Goldsmith's  rivals.  Colman,  too,  suffered  at  the  hands 
of  the  wits  for  his  gloomy  and  falsified  predictions;  and 
had,  indeed,  to  beg  Goldsmith  to  intercede  for  him.  It  is 
a  great  pity  that  Boswell  was  not  in  London  at  this  time; 
for  then  we  might  have  had  a  description  of  the  supper 
that  naturally  would  follow  the  play,  and  of  Goldsmith's 
demeanor  under  this  new  success.  Besides  the  gratification, 
moreover,  of  his  choice  of  materials  being  approved  by  the 
public,  there  was  the  material  benefit  accruing  to  him  from 


114  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

the  three  ''author's  nights."  These  are  supposed  to  have 
produced  nearly  live  hundred  pounds — a  substantial  sum  in 
those  days. 

Boswell  did  not  come  to  London  till  the  second  of  April 
following;  and  the  first  mention  we  find  of  Goldsmith  is  in 
connection  with  an  incident  which  has  its  ludicrous  as  well 
as  its  regretable  aspect.  The  further  success  of  She  Stoops 
to  Cojiquer  was  not  likely  to  propitiate  the  wretched  hole- 
and-corner  cut-throats  that  infested  the  journalism  of  that 
day.  More  especially  was  Kenrick  driven  mad  with  envy; 
and  so,  in  a  letter  addressed  to  the  London  Packet,  this 
poor  creature  determined  once  more  to  set  aside  the  judg- 
ment of  the  public,  and  show  Dr.  Goldsmith  in  his  true 
colors.  The  letter  is  a  wretched  production,  full  of  per- 
sonalities only  fit  for  an  angry  washerwoman,  and  of  rancor 
without  point.  But  there  was  one  passage  in  it  that  effect- 
ually roused  Goldsmith's  rage;  for  here  the  Jessamy  Bride 
was  introduced  as  *'the  lovely  H — k."  The  letter  was 
anonymous;  but  the  publisher  of  the  print,  a  man  called 
Evans,  was  known;  and  so  Goldsmith  thought  he  would  go 
and  give  Evans  a  beating.  If  he  had  asked  Johnson's 
advice  about  the  matter,  he  would  no  doubt  have  been  told 
to  pay  no  heed  at  all  to  anonymous  scurrility — certainly 
not  to  attempt  to  reply  to  it  with  a  cudgel.  When  John- 
son heard  that  Foote  meant  to  **  take  him  off,"  he  turned 
to  Davies  and  asked  him  what  was  the  common  price  of  an 
oak  stick;  but  an  oak  stick  in  Johnson's  hands  and  an  oak 
stick  in  Goldsmith's  hands  were  two  different  things. 
However,  to  the  book-seller's  shop  the  indignant  poet  pro- 
ceeded, in  company  with  a  friend;  got  hold  of  Evans;  ac- 
cused him  of  having  insulted  a  young  lady  by  putting  her 
name  in  his  paper;  and,  when  the  publisher  would  fain 
have  shifted  the  responsibility  on  to  the  editor,  forthwith 
denounced  him  as  a  rascal,  and  hit  him  over  the  back  with 
his  cane.  The  publisher,  however,  was  quite  a  match  for 
Goldsmith;  and  there  is  no  saying  how  the  deadly  combat 
might  have  ended,  had  not  a  lamp  been  broken  overhead, 
the  oil  of  which  drenched  both  the  warriors.  This  inter- 
vention of  the  superior  gods  was  just  as  successful  as  a 
Homeric  cloud;  the  fray  ceased;  Goldsmith  and  his  friend 
withdrew;  and  ultimately  an  action  for  assault  was  com- 
promised by  Goldsmith's  paying  fifty  pounds  to  a  charity. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUBB.  115 

Then  the  howl  of  the  journals  arose.  Their  prerogative 
had  been  assailed.  "■  Attacks  upon  private  character  were 
the  most  liberal  existing  source  of  newspaper  income/'  Mr. 
Forster  writes:  and  so  the  pack  turned  with  one  cry  on  the 
unlucky  poet.  There  was  nothing  of  "the  Monument" 
about  poor  Goldsmith;  and  at  last  he  was  worried  into 
writing  a  letter  of  defense  addressed  to  the  public.  "  He 
has  indeed  done  it  very  well/'  said  Johnson  to  Boswell, 
''but  it  is  a  foolish  thing  well  done."  And  further  he  re- 
marked, "  Why,  sir,  I  believe  it  is  the  first  time  he  has 
leat;  he  may  have  leen  beaten  before.  This,  sir,  is  a  new 
plume  to  iiim/' 


116  I'l^Sl  OF  GOLDBMITM. 


CHAPTER  XYII. 

nrCREASING   DIFFICULTIES — THE  EITD. 

The  pecuniary  success  of  She  Stoops  to  Conquer  did  but 
little  to  relieve  Goldsmith  from  those  financial  embarrass- 
ments which  were  now  weighing  heavily  on  his  mind. 
And  now  he  had  less  of  the  old  high  spirits  that  had  en- 
abled him  to  laugh  off  the  cares  of  debt.  His  health  be- 
came disordered;  an  old  disease  renewed  its  attacks,  and 
was  grown  more  violent  because  of  his  long-continued 
sedentary  habits.  Indeed,  from  this  point  to  the  day  of 
his  death — not  a  long  interval^  either — we  find  little  but  a 
record  of  successive  endeavors,  some  of  them  wild  and 
hopeless  enough,  to  obtain  money  anyhow.  Of  course  he 
went  to  the  club,  as  usual;  and  gave  dinner-parties,  and 
had  a  laugh  or  a  song  ready  for  the  occasion.  It  is  pos- 
sible, also,  to  trace  a  certain  growth  of  confidence  in  him- 
self, no  doubt  the  result  of  the  repeated  proofs  of  his 
genius  he  had  put  before  his  friends.  It  was  something 
more  than  mere  personal  intimacy  that  justified  the 
rebuke  he  administered  to  Reynolds,  when  the  latter 
painted  an  allegorical  picture  representing  the  triumph  of 
Beattie  and  Truth  over  Voltaire  and  Scepticism.  *'  It 
very  ill  becomes  a  man  of  your  eminence  and  character," 
he  said,  ''to  debase  so  high  a  genius  as  Voltaire  before 
so  mean  a  writer  as  Beattie.  Beattie  and  his  book  will  be 
forgotten  in  ten  years,  while  Voltaire's  fame  will  last  for- 
ever. Take  care  it  does  not  perpetuate  this  picture,  to  the 
shame  of  such  a  man  as  you."  He  was  aware,  too,  of  the 
position  he  had  won  for  himself  in  English  literature.  He 
knew  that  people  in  after-days  would  ask  about  him; 
an  J  it  was  with  no  sort  of  unwarrantable  vainglory  that 
he  gave  Percy  certain  materials  for  a  biography  which  he 
wished  him  to  undertake.     Hence  the  Percy  Memoir. 

He  was  only  forty-fiv3  when  lie  made  this  request;  and 


INGBEASING  DIFFlOULTIESr—THE  END.  117 

he  had  not  suffered  much  from  illness  during  his  life;  so 
that  there  was  apparently  no  grounds  for  imagining  that 
the  end  was  near.  But  at  this  time  Goldsmith  begun  to 
suffer  severe  fits  of  depression;  and  he  grew  irritable  and 
capricious  of  temper — no  doubt  another  result  of  failing 
health.  He  was  embroiled  in  disputes  with  the  book- 
sellers; and,  on  one  occasion,  seems  to  have  been  much 
hurt  because  Johnson,  who  had  been  asked  to  step  in  as 
arbiter,  decided  against  him.  He  was  offended  with  John- 
eon  on  another  occasion  because  of  his  sending  away 
certain  dishes  at  a  dinner  given  to  him  by  Goldsmith,  as  a 
hint  that  these  entertainments  were  too  luxurious  for  one 
in  Goldsmith's  position.  It  was  probably  owing  to  some 
temporary  feeling  of  this  sort — jierhaps  to  some  expression 
of  it  on  Goldsmith's  part — that  Johnson  spoke  of  Gold- 
smith's "malice"  toward  him.  Mrs.  Thrale  had  suggested 
that  Goldsmith  would  be  the  best  person  to  write  John- 
son's biography.  "  The  dog  would  write  it  best,  to  be 
sure,"  said  Johnson,  *'but  his  particular  malice  toward 
me,  and  general  disregard  of  truth,  would  make  the  book 
useless  to  all  and  injurious  to  my  character."  Of  course  it 
is  always  impossible  to  say  what  measure  of  jocular  exag- 
geration there  may  not  be  in  a  chance  phrase  such  as  this: 
of  the  fact  that  there  was  no  serious  or  permanent  quarrel 
between  the  two  friends  we  have  abundant  proof  in  Bos- 
well's  faithful  pages. 

To  return  to  the  various  endeavors  made  by  Goldsmith 
and  his  friends  to  meet  the  difficulties  now  closing  in 
around  him,  we  find,  first  of  all,  the  familiar  hack-work. 
For  two  volumes  of  a  History  of  Greece  he  had  received 
from  Griffin  £250.  Then  his  friends  tried  to  get  him  a 
pension  from  the  Government;  but  this  was  definitely 
refused.  An  expedient  of  his  own  seemed  to  promise  well 
at  first.  He  thought  of  bringing  out  a  Popular  Dictionary 
of  Arts  and  Sciences,  a  series  of  contributions  mostly  by 
his  friends,  with  himself  as  editor;  and  among  those  who 
offered  to  assist  him  Avere  Johnson,  Reynolds,  Burke  and 
Dr.  Burney.  But  the  book-sellers  were  afraid.  The  pro- 
ject would  involve  a  large  expense;  and  they  had  no  high 
opinion  of  Goldsmith's  business  habits.  Then  he  offered 
to  alter  Tlie  Good-natured  Man  for  Garrick;  but  Garrick 
preferred  to  treat  with  him  for  a  new  comedy,  and  gener- 


118  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

ously  allowed  him  to  draw  on  him  for  the  money  in 
advance.  This  last  help  enabled  him  to  go  to  Barton  for  a 
brief  holiday;  but  the  relief  was  only  temporary.  On  his 
return  to  London  even  hisnearest  friends  begun  to  observe 
the  change  in  his  manner.  In  the  old  days  Goldsmith  had 
faced  pecuniary  difficulties  with  a  light  heart;  but  now,  his 
health  broken,  and  every  avenue  of  escape  apparently 
closed,  he  was  giving  way  to  despair.  His  friend  Cradock, 
coming  up  to  town,  found  Goldsmith  in  a  most  despondent 
condition;  and  also  hints  that  the  unhappy  author  was 
trying  to  conceal  the  true  state  of  affairs.  "  I  believe," 
says  Cradock,  "  he  died  miserable,  and  that  his  friends 
"were  not  entirely  aware  of  his  distress." 

And  yet  it  was  during  this  closing  period  of  anxiety, 
despondency,  and  gloomy  foreboding  that  the  brilliant  and 
humorous  lines  of  Retaliation  were  written — that  last 
scintillation  of  the  bright  and  happy  genius  that  was 
soon  to  be  extinguished  forever.  The  most  varied  ac- 
counts have  been  given  of  the  origin  of  this  jeu  d'esprit; 
and  even  Garrick's,  which  was  meant  to  supersede  and  cor- 
rect all  others,  is  self -contradictory.  For  according  to  this 
version  of  the  story,  which  was  found  among  the  Garrick 
papers,  and  which  is  printed  in  Mr.  Cunningham's  edition 
of  Goldsmith's  works,  the  whole  thing  arose  out  of  Gold- 
smith and  Garrick  resolving  one  evening  at  the  St.  James' 
Coffee-House  to  write  each  other's  epitaph.  Garrick's  well- 
known  couplet  was  instantly  produced: 

"  Here  lies  Nolly  Goldsmith,  for  shortness  called  Noll, 
Who  wrote  like  an  angel,  but  talked  like  poor  Poll." 

Goldsmith,  according  to  Garrick,  either  would  not  or  could 
not  retort  at  the  moment;  "  but  went  to  work,  and  some 
weeks  after  produced  the  following  printed  poem,  called 
Retaliation,"  But  Garrick  himself  goes  on  to  say,  '*  The 
following  poems  in  manuscript  were  written  by  several  of 
the  gentlemen  on  purpose  to  provoke  the  Doctor  to  an 
answer,  which  came  forth  at  last  with  great  credit  to  him 
in  Retaliation."  The  most  probable  version  of  the  story, 
which  may  be  pieced  together  from  various  sources,  is  that 
at  the  coffee-house  named  this  business  of  writing  comic 
epitaphs  was  started  some  evening  or  other  by  the  whole 
company;  that  Goldsmith  and  Garrick  pitted  themselves 


LNCBEASINO  DIFFICULTIES—TEE  END.  119 

against  each  other;  that  thereafter  Goldsmith  began  as  oc- 
casion served  to  write  similar  squibs  about  his  friends,  which 
were  shown  about  as  they  were  written;  that  thereupon  those 
gentlemen,  not  to  be  behindhand,  composed  more  elaborate 
pieces  in  proof  of  their  wit;  and  that,  finally.  Goldsmith 
resolved  to  bind  these  fugitive  lines  of  his  together  in  a 
poem,  which  he  left  unfinished,  and  which  under  the  name 
of  Betaliation,  was  published  after  his  death.  This  liypo- 
thetical  account  receives  some  confirmation  from  the  fact 
that  the  scheme  of  the  poem  and  its  compotent  parts  do 
not  fit  together  well;  the  introduction  looks  like  an  after- 
thought, and  has  not  the  freedom  and  pungency  of  a  piece 
of  improvisation.  An  imaginary  dinner  is  described,  the 
guests  being  Garrick,  Reynolds,  Burke,  Cumberland,  and 
the  rest  of  them.  Goldsmith  last  of  all.  More  wine  is 
called  for,  until  the  whole  of  his  companions  have  fallen 
beneath  the  table: 

"  Then,  with  chaos  and  blunders  encircling  my  head. 
Let  me  ponder,  and  tell  what  I  think  of  the  dead." 

This  is  a  somewhat  clumsy  excuse  for  introducing  a 
series  of  epitaphs;  but  the  epitaphs  amply  atone  for  it. 
That  on  Garrick  is  especially  remarkable  as  a  bit  of  char- 
acter-sketching; its  shrewd  hints — all  in  perfect  courtesj 
and  good-humor — going  a  little  nearer  to  the  truth  than  h 
common  in  epitaphs  of  any  sort: 

"  Here  lies  David  Garrick,  describe  me  who  can; 
An  abridgment  of  all  that  was  pleasant  in  man. 
As  an  actor,  confessed  without  rival  to  shine; 
As  a  wit,  if  not  first,  in  the  very  first  line; 
Yet,  with  talents  like  these,  and  an  excellent  heart. 
The  man  had  his  failings,  a  dupe  to  his  art. 
Like  an  ill- judging  beauty,  his  colors  he  spread, 
And  beplastered  with  rouge  his  own  natural  red. 
On  the  stage  he  was  natural,  simple,  affecting; 
'Twas  only  that,  when  he  was  off,  he  was  acting. 
With  no  reason  on  earth  to  go  out  of  his  way. 
He  turned  and  he  varied  full  ten  times  a  day: 
Though  secure  of  our  hearts,  yet  confoundedly  sick 
If  they  were  not  his  own  by  finessing  and  trick; 
lie  cast  off  his  friends,  as  a  huntsman  his  pack. 
For  he  knew  when  he  pleased  he  could  whistle  them  back 
Of  praise  a  mere  glutton,  he  swallowed  what  came; 
And  tlie  puff  of  a  dunce,  he  mistook  it  for  fame; 
Till  his  relish  grown  callous,  almost  to  disease. 


laO  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

Who  peppered  the  highest  was  surest  to  please. 

But  let  us  be  candid,  and  speak  out  our  mind: 

It  dunces  applaud,  he  paid  them  in  kind. 

Ye  Kenricks,  ye  Kellys,  and  Woodfalls  so  grave. 

What  a  commerce  was  yours,  while  you  got  and  you  gave? 

How  did  Grub  Street  re-echo  the  shouts  that  you  raised. 

While  he  was  be-Rosciused,  and  you  were  bepraised. 

But  peace  to  his  spirit,  wherever  it  flies, 

To  act  as  an  angel  and  mix  with  the  skies: 

Those  poets  who  owe  their  best  fame  to  his  skiU 

Shall  still  be  his  flatterers,  go  where  he  will; 

Old  Shakespeare  receive  Mm  with  praise  and  with  love, 

And  Beaumonts  and  Bens  be  his  Kellys  above." 

The  truth  is  that  Goldsmith,  though  he  was  ready  to  bless 
his  "  honest  little  man  "  when  he  received  from  him  sixty 
pounds  in  advance  for  a  comedy  not  begun,  never  took 
quite  so  kindly  to  Garrick  as  to  some  of  his  other  friends. 
There  is  no  pretence  of  discrimination  at  all,  for  examnle, 
in  the  lines  devoted  in  this  poem  to  Eeynolds.      All  the 

fenerous  enthusiasm  of  Goldsmith's  Irish  nature  appears 
ere;  he  will  admit  of  no  possible  rival  to  this  especial 
friend  of  his: 

"  Here  Reynolds  is  laid,  and  to  tell  you  my  mind, 
He  has  not  left  a  wiser  or  better  behind." 

There  is  a  tradition  that  the  epitaph  on  Eeynolds,  ending 
with  the  unfinished  line 

"  By  flattery  unspoiled " 

was  Goldsmith's  last  piece  of  writing.  One  would  like  to 
believe  that,  in  any  case. 

Goldsmith  had  returned  to  his  Edgware  lodgings,  and 
had,  indeed,  formed  some  notion  of  selling  his  chambers 
in  the  Temple,  and  living  in  the  country  for  at  least  ten 
months  in  the  year,  when  a  sudden  attack  of  his  old  dis- 
order drove  him  into  town  again  for  medical  advice.  He 
would  appear  to  have  received  some  relief;  but  a  nervous 
fever  followed;  and  on  the  night  of  the  25th  of  March,  1774, 
when  he  was  but  forty-six  years  of  age,  he  took  to  his  bed 
for  the  last  time.  At  first  he  refused  to  regard  his  illness 
as  serious,  and  insisted  on  dosing  himself  with  certain 
fever-powders  from  which  he  had  received  benefit  on  pre- 
Yious  occasions;  but  by  and  by  as  his  strength  gave  way  he 


INCREASING  DIFFICULTIES-^THE  END.  131 

submitted  to  the  advice  of  the  physicians  who  were  in  at- 
tendance on  him.  Day  after  day  passed,  his  weakness 
visibly  increasing,  though,  curiously  enough,  the  symptoms 
of  fever  were  gradually  abating.  At  length  one  of  the 
doctors,  remarking  to  him  that  his  pulse  was  in  greater 
disorder  than  it  should  be  from  the  degree  of  fever,  asked 
him  if  his  mind  was  at  ease.  "No,  it  is  not,"  answered 
Goldsmith;  and  these  were  his  last  words.  Early  in  the 
morning  of  Monday,  Ajsril  4th,  convulsions  set  in;  these 
continued  for  rather  more  than  an  hour;  then  the  troubled 
brain  and  the  sick  heart  found  rest  forever. 

When  the  news  was  carried  to  his  friends,  Burke,  it  is 
said,  burst  into  tears,  and  Reynolds  put  aside  his  work 
for  the  day.  But  it  does  not  appear  that  they  had  vis- 
ited him  during  his  illness;  and  neither  Johnson  nor 
Reynolds,  nor  Burke,  nor  Garrick,  followed  his  body  to 
the  grave.  It  is  true,  a  public  funeral  was  talked  of; 
and,  among  others,  Reynolds,  Burke  and  Garrick  were 
to  have  carried  the  pall;  but  this  was  abandoned;  and  Gold- 
smith was  privately  buried  in  the  grounds  of  the  Temple 
Church  on  the  9th  of  April,  1774.  Strangely  enough,  too, 
Johnson  seems  to  have  omitted  all  mention  of  Goldsmith 
from  his  letters  to  Boswell.  It  was  not  until  Boswell  had 
written  to  him,  on  June  24th,  "  You  have  said  nothing  to 
me  about  poor  Goldsmith,"  that  Johnson,  writing  on  July 
4th,  answered  as  follows:  "Of  jjoor  dear  Dr.  Goldsmith  there 
is  little  to  be  told,  more  than  the  papers  have  made  public. 
He  died  of  a  fever,  made,  I  am  afraid,  more  violent  by 
uneasiness  of  mind.  His  debts  begun  to  be  heavy,  and  all 
his  resources  were  exhausted.  Sir  Joshua  is  of  opinion 
that  he  owed  not  less  than  two  thousand  pounds.  Was  ever 
poet  so  trusted  before?" 

But  if  the  greatest  grief  at  the  sudden  and  premature 
death  of  Goldsmith  would  seem  to  have  been  shown  at  the 
moment  by  certain  wretched  creatures  who  were  found 
weeping  on  the  stairs  loading  to  his  chambers,  it  must  not 
be  supposed  that  his  fine  friends  either  forgot  him,  or 
ceased  to  regard  his  memory  with  a  great  gentleness  and 
kindness.  Some  two  years  after,  when  a  monument  was 
about  to  be  erected  to  Goldsmith  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
Johnson  consented  to  write  "  the  poor  clear  Doctor's  epi- 
taph;" and  SO  anxious  were  the  members  of  that  famous 


122  LIFE  OF  GOLDSMITH. 

circle  in  which  Goldsmith  had  figured,  that  a  just  tribute 
should  be  paid  to  his  genius,  that  they  even  ventured  to 
send  a  round-robin  to  the  great  Cham  desiring  him  to 
amend  his  first  draft.  Now,  perhaps,  we  have  less  interest 
in  Johnson's  estimate  of  Goldsmith's  genius — though  it 
contains  the  famous  Nullum  quod  tetigit  non  ornavit — than 
in  the  phrases  which  tell  of  the  honor  paid  to  the  memory 
of  the  dead  poet  by  the  love  of  his  companions  and  the 
faithfulness  of  his  friends.  It  may  here  be  added  that  the 
precise  spot  where  Goldsmith  was  buried  in  the  Temple 
church- yard  is  unknown.  So  lived  and  so  died  Oliver 
Goldsmith. 


In  the  foregoing  pages  the  writings  of  Goldsmith  have 
been  given  so  prominent  a  place  in  the  history  of  his  life 
that  it  is  unnecessary  to  take  them  here  collectively  and 
endeavor  to  sum  up  their  distinctive  qualities.  As  much 
as  could  be  said  within  the  limited  space  has,  it  is  hoped, 
been  said  about  their  genuine  and  tender  pathos,  that  never 
at  any  time  verges  on  the  affected  or  theatrical;  about  their 
quaint,  delicate,  delightful  humor ;  about  that  broader 
humor  that  is  not  afraid  to  provoke  the  wholesome  laughter 
of  mankind  by  dealing  with  common  and  familiar  ways, 
and  manners  and  men;  about  that  choiceness  of  diction, 
that  lightness  and  grace  of  touch,  that  lend  a  charm  even 
to  Goldsmith's  ordinary  hack-work. 

Still  less  necessary,  perhaps,  is  it  to  review  the  facts  and 
circumstances  of  Goldsmith's  life,  and  to  make  of  them  an 
example,  a  warning,  or  an  accusation.  That  has  too  often 
been  done.  His  name  has  been  used  to  glorify  a  sham  Bohe- 
mianism — a  Bohemianism  that  finds  it  easy  to  live  in  tav- 
erns, but  does  not  find  it  easy,  so  far  as  one  sees,  to  write 
poems  like  the  Deserted  Village.  His  experiences  as 
an  author  have  been  brought  forward  to  swell  the  cry 
about  neglected  genius  —  that  is,  by  writers  who  assume 
their  genius  in  order  to  prove  the  neglect.  The  misery 
that  occasionally  befell  him  during  his  wayward  career 
has  been  made  the  basis  of  an  accusation  against 
society,  the  English  constitution,  Christianity — Heaven 
knows  what.  It  is  time  to  have  done  with  all  this  non- 
eense.     Goldsmith  resorted  to  the  hack-work  of  literature 


INCkEASma  DIFFICULTIES-TEE  END.         133 

when  everything  else  had  failed  him  ;  and  he  was  fairly  paid 
for  it.  When  he  did  better  work,  when  he  **  struck  for 
honest  fame,"  the  nation  gave  him  all  the  honor  that  he 
could  have  desired.  With  an  assured  reputation,  and  with 
ample  means  of  subsistence,  he  obtained  entrance  into  the 
most  distinguished  society  then  in  England — he  was  made 
the  friend  of  England's  greatest  in  the  arts  and  literature — 
and  could  have  confined  himself  to  that  society  exclusively 
if  he  had  chosen.  His  temperament,  no  doubt,  exposed 
him  to  suffering ;  and  the  exquisite  sensitiveness  of  a  man 
of  genius  may  demand  our  sympathy  ;  but  in  far  greater 
measure  is  our  sympathy  demanded  for  the  thousands  upon 
thousands  of  people  who,  from  illness  or  nervous  excita- 
bility, suffer  from  quite  as  keen  a  sensitiveness  without  the 
consolation  of  the  fame  that  genius  brings. 

In  plain  truth.  Goldsmith  himself  would  have  been  the 
last  to  put  forward  pleas  humiliating  alike  to  himself  and 
to  his  calling.  Instead  of  beseeching  the  State  to  look 
after  authors  ;  instead  of  imploring  society  to  grant  them 
**  recognition  ;"  instead  of  saying  of  himself  '*  he  wrote, 
and  paid  the  penalty ;"  he  would  frankly  have  admitted 
that  he  chose  to  live  his  life  his  own  way,  and  therefore 
paid  the  penalty.  This  is  not  written  with  any  desire  of 
upbraiding  Goldsmith.  He  did  choose  to  live  his  own  life 
his  own  way,  and  we  now  have  the  splendid  and  beautiful 
results  of  his  work ;  and  the  world — looking  at  these  with 
a  constant  admiration,  and  with  a  great  and  lenient  love 
for  their  author — is  not  anxious  to  know  what  he  did  with 
his  guineas,  or  whether  his  milkman  was  ever  paid.  "  He 
had  raised  money  and  squandered  it,  by  every  artifice  of 
acquisition  and  folly  of  expense.  But  let  not  his  frail- 
ties BE  remembered;  he  was  AVERY  GREAT  MAN."     This 

is  Johnson's  wise  summing  up  ;  and  with  it  we  may  her© 
take  leave  of  gentle  Goldsmith. 


22— G  &  G — r 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

A  POEM. 


DEDICATION. 


To  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds. 

Deae  Sir  :  I  can  have  no  expectation,  in  an  address 
of  this  kind,  either  to  add  to  your  reputation,  or  to 
establish  my  own.  You  can  gain  nothing  from  my 
admiration,  as  I  am  ignorant  of  that  art  in  which  you 
are  said  to  excel ;  and  I  may  lose  much  by  the  severity 
of  your  judgment,  as  few  have  a  juster  taste  in  poetry 
than  you.  Setting  interest,  therefore,  aside,  to  which 
I  never  paid  much  attention,  I  must  be  indulged  at 
present  in  following  my  affections.  The  only  dedica- 
tion I  ever  made  was  to  my  brother,  because  I  loved 
him  better  than  most  other  men.  He  is  since  dead. 
Permit  me  to  inscribe  this  poem  to  you. 

How  far  you  may  be  pleased  with  the  versification 
and  mere  mechanical  parts  of  this  attempt,  I  don't 
pretend  to  inquire ;  but  I  know  you  will  object  (and 
indeed  several  of  our  best  and  wisest  friends  concur  in 
the  opinion),  that  the  depopulation  it  deplores  is  no- 
where to  be  seen,  and  the  disorders  it  laments  are  only 
to  be  found  in  the  poet's  irapgination.  To  this  I  can 
scarce  make  any  other  answer  than  that  I  sincerely 
believe  what  I  have  written  ;  that  I  have  taken  all  ]ios- 
sible  pains,  in  my  country  excursions,  for  these  four  or 

five  years  past,  to  be  certain  of  what  I  allege ;  and  that 

127 


128  DEDICATION. 

all  my  views  and  inquiries  have  led  me  to  believe  those 
miseries  real,  which  I  here  attempt  to  display.  But 
this  is  not  the  place  to  enter  into  an  inquiry  whether 
the  country  be  depopulating  or  not :  the  discussion 
would  take  up  much  room,  and  I  should  prove  myself, 
at  best,  an  indifferent  politician,  to  tire  the  reader  with 
a  long  preface,  when  I  want  his  unfatigued  attention 
to  a  long  poem. 

In  regretting  the  depopulation  of  the  country,  I  in 
veigh  against  the  increase  of  our  luxuries ;  and  here 
also  I  expect  the  shout  of  modern  politicians  against 
me.  For  twenty  or  thirty  years  past,  it  has  been  the 
fashion  to  consider  luxury  as  one  of  the  greatest  na- 
tional advantages ;  and  all  the  wisdom  of  antiquity  in 
that  particular  as  erroneous.  Still,  however,  I  must 
remain  a  professed  ancient  on  that  head,  and  continue 
to  think  those  luxuries  prejudicial  to  states  by  which 
so  many  vices  are  introduced,  and  so  many  kingdoms 
have  been  undone.  Indeed,  so  much  has  been  poured 
out  of  late  on  the  other  side  of  the  question,  that,  merely 
for  the  sake  of  novelty  and  variety,  one  would  some- 
times wish  to  be  in  the  right. 

I  am,  dear  sir,  your  sincere  friend,  and  ardent  ad- 
mirer, 

Oliver  Goldsmith. 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.* 


Sweet  Auburn  !  loveliest  village  of  the  plain, 
Where  health  and  plenty  cheered  the  laboring  swain, 
"Where  smiling  spring  its  earliest  visit  paid, 
And  parting  summer's  lingering  blooms  delay'd : 
Dear  lovely  bowers  of  innocence  and  ease, 
Seats  of  my  youth,  when  every  sport  could  please, 
How  often  have  I  loiter'd  o'er  thy  green, 
Where  humble  happiness  endear'd  each  scene! 
How  often  have  I  paused  on  every  charm, 
The  shelter'd  cot,  the  cultivated  farm. 
The  never-failing  brook,  the  busy  mill. 
The  decent  church  that  topt  the  neighboring  hill. 
The  hawthorn  bush,  with  seats  beneath  the  shade, 
For  talking  age  and  whisp'ring  lovers  made. 
How  often  have  I  blest  the  coming  day. 
When  toil  remitting  lent  its  turn  to  play, 
And  all  the  village  train,  from  labor  free, 
Led  up  their  sports  beneath  the  spreading  tree ; 

*  Tlie  locality  of  this  poem  is  supposed  to  be  Lissoy,  near  Bally- 
mahon,  where  the  poet's  brother  Henry  had  his  living.  As  usual 
in  such  cases,  the  place  afterward  became  the  fashionable  resort 
of  poetical  pilgrims,  and  paid  the  customary  penalty  of  furnish- 
ing relics  for  the  curious.  The  hawthorn  hush  has  been  converted 
into  snuff-boxes,  and  now  adorns  the  cabinets  of  virtuosi. 
9  129 


130  TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

While  many  a  pastime  circled  in  the  shade, 

The  young  contending  as  the  old  survey'd  ; 

And  many  a  gambol  frolick'd  o'er  the  ground, 

And  sleights  of  art  and  feats  of  strength  went  round; 

And  still  as  each  repeated  pleasure  tired, 

Succeeding  sports  the  mirthful  band  inspired ; 

The  dancing  pair  that  simply  sought  renown, 

By  holding  out  to  tire  each  other  down ; 

The  swain,  mistrustless  of  his  smutted  face. 

While  secret  laughter  titter'd  round  the  place ; 

The  bashful  virgin's  sidelong  looks  of  love, 

The  matron's  glance  that  would  those  looks  reprove : 

These  were  thy  charms  sweet  village  !  sports  like  these^ 

With  sweet  succession,  taught  e'en  toil  to  please ; 

These  round  thy  bowers  their  cheerful  influence  shed, 

These  were  thy  charms — but  all  these  charms  are  fled. 

Sweet,  smiling  village,  loveliest  of  the  lawn. 
Thy  sports  are  fled,  and  all  thy  charms  withdrawn ! 
Amidst  thy  bowers  the  tyrant's  hand  is  seen, 
And  desolation  saddens  all  thy  green  : 
One  only  master  grasps  the  whole  domain, 
And  half  a  tillage  stints  thy  smiling  plain. 
No  more  thy  glassy  brook  reflects  the  day. 
But,  choked  with  sedges,  works  its  weedy  way  ; 
Along  thy  glades,  a  solitary  guest. 
The  hollow-sounding  bittern  guards  its  nest ; 
Amidst  thy  desert  walks  the  lapwing  flies. 
And  tires  their  echoes  with  unvaried  cries : 
Sunk  are  thy  bowers  in  shapeless  ruin  all, 
And  the  long  grass  o'ertops  the  moldering  wall ; 
And,  trembling,  shrinking  from  the  spoiler's  hand, 
Far,  far  away,  thy  children  leave  the  land. 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  131 

111  fares  the  land,  to  hastening  ills  a  prey, 
Where  wealth  accumulates,  and  men  decay  : 
Princes  and  lords  may  flourish,  or  may  fade ; 
A  breath  can  make  them,  as  a  breath  has  made; 
But  a  bold  peasantry,  their  country's  pride, 
When  once  destroy'd,  can  never  be  supplied. 


A  time  there  was,  ere  England's  griefs  began, 
When  every  rood  of  ground  maintain'd  its  man : 
For  him  light  labor  spread  her  wholesome  store, 
Just  gave  what  life  required,  but  gave  no  more : 
His  best  companions,  innocence  and  health, 
And  his  best  riches,  ignorance  of  wealth. 

But  times  are  alter'd :  trade's  unfeeling  train 
Usurp  the  land,  and  dispossess  the  swain ; 
Along  the  lawn,  where  scatter'd  hamlets  rose. 
Unwieldy  wealth  and  cumbrous  pomp  repose. 
And  every  want  to  opulence  allied. 
And  every  pang  that  folly  pays  to  pride. 
These  gentle  hours  that  plenty  bade  to  bloom, 
Those  calm  desires  that  ask'd  but  little  room, 
Those  healthful  sports  that  graced  the  peaceful  scenes, 
Lived  in  each  look,  and  brighten'd  all  the  green, — 
These,  far  departing,  seek  a  kinder  shore. 
And  rural  mirth  and  manners  are  no  more. 


Sweet  Auburn  !  parent  of  the  blissful  hour, 
Thy  glades  forlorn  confess  the  tyrant's  power. 
Here,  as  I  take  my  solitary  rounds. 
Amidst  thy  tangling  walks  and  ruin'd  grounds, 


132  TRE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

And,  many  a  year  elapsed,  return  to  view  * 
Where  once  the  cottage  stood,  the  hawthorn  grew„ 
Remembrance  wakes  with  all  her  busy  train. 
Swells  at  my  breast,  and  turns  the  past  to  pain. 

In  all  my  wand'rings  round  this  world  of  care, 
In  all  my  griefs — and  God  has  given  my  share — 
I  still  had  hopes,  my  latest  hours  to  crown, 
Amidst  these  humble  bowers  to  lay  me  down  ; 
To  husband  out  life's  taper  at  the  close. 
And  keep  the  flame  from  wasting,  by  repose : 
I  still  had  hopes — for  pride  attends  us  still — 
Amidst  the  swains  to  show  my  book-learn'd  skill,; 
Around  my  fire  an  evening  group  to  draw, 
And  tell  of  all  I  felt  and  all  I  saw  ; 
And,  as  a  hare,  whom  hounds  and  horns  pursue, 
Pants  to  the  place  from  whence  at  first  she  flew, 
I  still  had  hopes,  my  long  vexations  past, 
Here  to  return — and  die  at  home  at  last. 

O,  blest  retirement,  friend  to  life's  decline, 
Retreats  from  care  that  never  must  be  mine ! 
How  happy  he  who  crowns,  in  shades  like  these, 
A  youth  of  labor  with  an  age  of  ease ; 
"Who  quits  a  world  where  strong  temptations  try. 
And,  since  'tis  hard  to  combat,  learns  to  fly ! 
For  him  no  wretches,  born  to  work  and  weep, 
Explore  the  mine,  or  tempt  the  dang'rous  deep ; 

*At  Lissoy  it  was  believed  that  Goldsmith  visited  Ireland 
shortly  after  his  return  from  his  wanderings  on  the  Continent,  as 
he  said  he  would  in  his  letter  to  his  brother-in-law  Hodson  (Dec. 
27,  1757),  and  that  part  of  this  poem  was  actually  written  in  the 
village. 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  133 

No  surly  porter  stands  in  guilty  state, 
To  spurn  imploring  famine  from  the  gate: 
But  on  he  moves  to  meet  his  latter  end, 
Angels  around  befriending  virtue's  friend ; 
Bends  to  the  grave  with  unperceived  decay, 
While  resignation  gently  slopes  the  way ; 
And,  all  his  prospects  brightening  to  the  last, 
flis  heaven  commences  ere  the  world  be  past !  * 

Sweet  was  the  sound,  when  oft,  at  evening's  close, 
Up  yonder  hill  the  village  murmur  rose : 
There,  as  I  past  with  careless  steps  and  slow. 
The  mingling  notes  came  sof ten'd  from  below ; 
The  swain  responsive  as  the  milk-maid  sung, 
The  sober  herd  that  low'd  to  meet  their  young ; 
The  noisy  geese  that  gabbled  o'er  the  pool. 
The  playful  children  just  let  loose  from  school : 
The  watch-dog's  voice  that  bay'd  the  whispering  wind, 
And  the  loud  laugh  that  spoke  the  vacant  mind, 
These  all  in  sweet  confusion  sought  the  shade, 
And  fiU'd  each  pause  the  nightingale  had  made. 
But  now  the  sounds  of  population  fail. 
No  cheerful  murmurs  fluctuate  in  the  gale, 
No  busy  steps  the  grass-grown  footway  tread, 
But  all  the  bloomy  flush  of  life  is  fled ! 
All  but  yon  widow'd,  solitary  thing. 
That  feebly  bends  beside  the  plashy  spring ; 

*  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  drew  the  idea  of  his  "Resignation" 
from  these  lines.  When  the  picture  was  engraved  by  T.  Wat- 
son, the  painter  inscribed  it  to  Goldsmith,  saying  :  "  This  at- 
tempt to  describe  a  character  in  '  The  Deserted  Village '  is 
dedicated  to  Dr.  Goldsmith  by  his  sincere  friend  and  admirer 
Joshua  Reynolds." 


134  TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

She,  wretched  matron,  forced  in  age,  for  bread, 

To  strip  the  brook  with  mantling  cresses  spread, 

To  pick  her  wintry  fagot  from  the  thorn, 

To  seek  her  nightly  shed,  and  weep  till  morn ; 

She  only  left,  of  all  the  harmless  train. 

The  sad  historian  of  the  pensive  plain. 

Near  yonder  copse,  where  once  the  garden  smiled, 
And  still  where  many  a  garden  flower  grows  wild, 
There,  where  a  few  torn  shrubs  the  place  disclose. 
The  village  preacher's  modest  mansion  rose. 
A  man  he  was  to  all  the  country  dear, 
And  passing  rich  with  forty  pounds  a  year  : 
Remote  from  towns  he  ran  his  godly  race, 
Nor  e'er  had  changed,  nor  wish'd  to  change,  his  place ; 
Unpractis'd  he  to  fawn,  or  seek  for  power, 
By  doctrines  fashion'd  to  the  varying  hour ; 
Far  other  aims  his  heart  had  learn'd  to  prize, 
More  skill'd  to  raise  the  wretched  than  to  rise. 
His  house  was  known  to  all  the  vagrant  train. 
He  chid  their  wand'rings,  but  relieved  their  pain : 
The  long  remember'd  beggar  was  his  guest. 
Whose  beard  descending  swept  his  aged  breast ; 
The  ruin'd  spendthrift,  now  no  longer  proud, 
Claim'd  kindred  there,  and  had  his  claims  allow'd  ; 
The  broken  soldier,  kindly  bade  to  stay, 
Sat  by  his  fire,  and  talk'd  the  night  away, 
Wept  o'er  his  wounds,  or  tales  of  sorrow  done, 
Shoulder'd  his  crutch,   and   show'd  how  fields  were 

won. 
Pleased  with  his   guests,  the   good   man   learn'd   to 

glow. 
And  quite  forgot  their  vices  in  their  woe: 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  135 

Careless  their  merits  or  their  faults  to  scan, 
His  pity  gave  ere  charity  began. 

Thus  to  relieve  the  "wretched  was  his  pride, 
And  e'en  his  failings  lean'd  to  virtue's  side ; 
But  in  his  duty  prompt  at  every,  call ; 
He  watch'd  and  wept,  he  pray'd  and  felt,  for  all ; 
And,  as  a  bird  each  fond  endearment  tries 
To  tempt  its  new-fledged  offspring  to  the  skies, 
He  tried  each  art,  reproved  each  dull  delay. 
Allured  to  brighter  worlds,  and  led  the  way. 

Beside  the  bed  where  parting  life  was  laid, 
And  sorrow,  guilt,  and  pain,  by  turns  dismay'd, 
The  reverend  champion  stood.     At  his  control, 
Despair  and  anguish  fled  the  struggling  soul ; 
Comfort  came  down  the  trembling  wretch  to  raise, 
And  his  last  faltering  accents  whisper'd  praise. 

At  church,  with  meek  and  unaffected  grace. 
His  looks  adorn' d  the  venerable  place ; 
Truth  from  his  lips  prevail'd  with  double  sway. 
And  fools  who  came  to  scoff,  remain 'd  to  pray. 
The  service  past,  around  the  pious  man, 
With  steady  zeal,  each  honest  rustic  ran  ; 
E'en  children  followed,  with  endearing  wile. 
And  pluck'd  his  gown,  to  share  the  good  man's  smile. 
His  ready  smile  a  parent's  warmth  exprest, 
Their  welfare  pleased  him,  and  their  cares  distrest ; 
To  them  his  heart,  his  love,  his  griefs  were  given, 
But  all  his  serious  thoughts  had  rest  in  heaven. 
As  some  tall  cliff  that  lifts  its  awful  form. 
Swells  from  the  vale,  and  midway  leaves  the  storm. 


136  THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

Though  round  its  breast  the  rolling  clouds  are  spread. 
Eternal  sunshine  settles  on  its  head. 

Beside  yon  straggling  fence  that  skirts  the  way, 
"With  blossom'd  furze  unprofitably  gay, 
There,  in  his  noisy  mansion,  skill'd  to  rule, 
The  village  master  taught  his  little  school. 
A  man  severe  he  was,  and  stern  to  view ; 
I  knew  him  vs^ell,  and  every  truant  knew : 
Well  had  the  boding  tremblers  learn'd  to  trace 
The  day's  disasters  in  his  morning  face ; 
Full  well  they  laugh'd,  with  counterfeited  glee, 
At  all  his  jokes,  for  many  a  joke  had  he  ; 
Full  well  the  busy  whisper,  circling  round, 
Convey'd  the  dismal  tidings  when  he  frown'd : 
Yet  he  was  kind,  or,  if  severe  in  aught. 
The  love  he  bore  to  learning  was  in  fault. 
The  village  all  declared  how  much  he  knew ; 
'Twas  certain  he  could  write,  and  cipher  too ; 
Lands  he  could  measure,  terms  and  tides  presage, 
And  e'en  the  story  ran — that  he  could  gauge : 
In  arguing,  too,  the  parson  own'd  his  skill. 
For  ev'n  though  vanquish'd  he  could  argue  still ; 
"While  words  of  learned  length,  and  thund'ring  sound, 
Amazed  the  gazing  rustics  ranged  around  ; 
And  still  they  gazed,  and  still  the  wonder  grew 
That  one  small  head  could  carry  all  he  knew. 
But  past  is  all  his  fame.     The  very  spot 
Where  many  a  time  he  triumph'd,  is  forgot. 

Near  yonder  thorn,  that  lifts  its  head  on  high, 
Where  once  the  sign-post  caught  the  passing  eye. 
Low  lies  that  house  where  nut-brown  draughts  inspired, 
Where  gray  beard  mirth,  and  smiling  toil  retired, 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  137 

"Where  village  statesmen  talk'd  with  looks  profound, 

And  news  much  older  than  their  ale  went  round. 

Imagination  fondly  stoops  to  trace 

The  parlor  splendors  of  that  festive  place : 

The  whitewash'd  wall,  the  nicely  sanded  floor, 

The  varnish'd  clock  that  click'd  behind  the  door ; 

The  chest  contrived  a  double  debt  to  pay, 

A  bed  by  night,  a  chest  of  drawers  by  day ; 

The  pictures  placed  for  ornament  and  use, 

The  Twelve  Good  Rules,*  the  Royal  Game  of  Goose; 

The  hearth,  except  when  winter  chill'd  the  day, 

With  aspen  boughs,  and  flowers,  and  fennel  gay, 

"While  broken  teacups,  wisely  kept  for  show, 

Ranged  o'er  the  chimney,  glisten'd  in  a  row. 

Yain,  transitory  splendors  !     Could  not  all 
Reprieve  the  tottering  mansion  from  its  fall  ? 
Obscure  it  sinks,  nor  shall  it  more  impart 
An  hour's  importance  to  the  poor  man's  heart : 
Thither  no  more  the  peasant  shall  repair, 
To  sweet  oblivion  of  his  daily  care; 
No  more  the  farmer's  news,  the  barber's  tale, 
No  more  the  woodman's  ballad  shall  prevail ; 
No  more  the  smith  his  dusky  brow  shall  clear, 
Relax  his  pond'rous  strength,  and  lean  to  hear ; 
The  host  himself  no  longer  shall  be  found 
Careful  to  see  the  mantling  bliss  go  round  ; 
Nor  the  coy  maid,  half  willing  to  be  pressed, 
Shall  kiss  the  cup  to  pass  it  to  the  rest.f 

*  King  Charles'  "  Twelve  Good  Rules,"  a  wall  decoration  of 
the  time,  is  also  mentioned  by  Goldsmith  in  his  "  Description  of 
the  Author's  Bed-chamber"  (p.  198).  Crabbe  likewise  mentions 
them  in  his  "  Parish  Register." — Ed. 

t  The  Lissoy  ale-house,  tlien  or  afterward  called  the  Three 
Pigeons,  is  sketched  here,  no  doubt. 


138  THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

Yes !  let  the  rich  deride,  the  proud  disdain, 
These  simple  blessings  of  the  lowly  train  ; 
To  me  more  dear,  congenial  to  my  heart, 
One  native  charm,  than  all  the  gloss  of  art. 
Spontaneous  joys,  where  nature  has  its  play, 
The  soul  adopts,  and  owns  their  firstborn  sway ; 
Lightly  they  frolic  o'er  the  vacant  mind, 
Unenvied,  unmolested,  unconfined : 
But  the  long  pomp,  the  midnight  masquerade. 
With  all  the  freaks  of  wanton  wealth  array 'd, — 
In  these,  ere  triflers  half  their  wish  obtain, 
The  toiling  pleasure  sickens  into  pain  ; 
And,  e'en  while  fashion's  brightest  arts  decoy, 
The  heart,  distrusting,  asks — if  this  be  joy  ? 

Ye  friends  to  truth,  ye  statesmen,  who  survey 
The  rich  man's  joys  increase,  the  poor's  decay, 
'Tis  yours  to  judge,  how  wide  the  litnits  stand 
Between  a  splendid  and  a  happy  land. 
Proud  swells  the  tide  with  loads  of  freighted  ore, 
And  shouting  Folly  hails  them  from  her  shore ; 
Hoards,  e'en  beyond  the  miser's  wish  abound. 
And  rich  men  flock  from  all  the  world  around. 
Yet,  count  our  gains.     This  wealth  is  but  a  name 
That  leaves  our  useful  products  still  the  same. 
Not  so  the  loss.     The  man  of  wealth  and  pride 
Takes  up  a  space  that  many  poor  supplied  ; 
Space  for  his  lake,  his  park's  extended  bounds ; 
Space  for  his  horses,  equipage  and  hounds  : 
The  robe  that  wraps  his  limbs  in  silken  sloth, 
Has  robb'd  the  neighboring  fields  of  half  their  growth ; 
His  seat,  where  solitary  sports  are  seen. 
Indignant  spurns  the  cottage  from  the  green  ; 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  139 

Around  the  world  each  needful  product  flies, 
For  all  the  luxuries  the  world  supplies : — 
While  thus  the  land  adorn'd  for  pleasure,  all 
In  barren  splendor  feebly  w^aits  the  fail. 

As  some  fair  female,  unadorn'd  and  plain. 
Secure  to  please  while  youth  confirms  her  reign. 
Slights  every  borrow'd  charm  that  dress  supplies. 
Nor  shares  with  art  the  triumph  of  her  eyes  ; 
But   when   those  charms   are  past — for   charms    are 

frail — 
"When  time  advances,  and  when  lovers  fail. 
She  then  shines  forth,  solicitous  to  bless, 
In  all  the  glaring  impotence  of  dress  : 
Thus  fares  the  land,  by  luxury  betray'd  ; 
In  Nature's  simplest  charms  at  first  array'd  : 
But  verging  to  decline,  its  splendors  rise, 
Its  vistas  strike,  its  palaces  surprise  ; 
While,  scourged  by  famine  from  the  smiling  land, 
The  mournful  peasant  leads  his  humble  band  ; 
And  while  he  sinks,  without  one  arm  to  save. 
The  country  blooms — a  garden,  and  a  grave. 

Where,  then,  ah  !  where,  shall  Poverty  reside, 
To  'scape  the  pressure  of  contiguous  pride  ? 
If  to  some  common's  fenceless  limits  stray'd, 
He  drives  his  flock  to  pick  the  scanty  blade. 
Those  fenceless  fields  the  sons  of  wealth  divide, 
And  ev'n  the  bare-worn  common  is  denied. 

If  to  the  city  sped — what  waits  him  there? 
To  see  profusion  that  he  must  not  share ; 


140  THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

To  see  ten  thousand  baneful  arts  combined 

To  pamper  luxury  and  thin  mankind  ; 

To  see  those  joys  the  sons  of  pleasure  know 

Extorted  from  his  fellow-creatures'  woe. 

Here,  while  the  courtier  glitters  in  brocade, 

There  the  pale  artist  plies  his  sickly  trade ; 

Here,  while  the  proud  their  long  drawn  pomps  display, 

There  the  black  gibbet  glooms  beside  the  way. 

The  dome  where  Pleasure  holds  her  midnight  reign, 

Here,  richly  deck'd,  admits  the  gorgeous  train  ; 

Tumultuous  grandeur  crowds  the  blazing  square, 

The  rattling  chariots  clash,  the  torches  glare. 

Sure,  scenes  like  these  no  troubles  e'er  annoy. 

Sure,  these  denote  one  universal  joy  ! 

Are  these  thy  serious  thoughts  ? — Ah,  turn  thine  eyes 

Where  the  poor  houseless  shivering  female  lies : 

She  once,  perhaps,  in  village  plenty  blest. 

Has  wept  at  tales  of  innocence  distrest ; 

Her  modest  looks  the  cottage  might  adorn, 

Sweet  as  the  primrose  peeps  beneath  the  thorn : 

Now  lost  to  all — her  friends,  her  virtue  fled. 

Near  her  betra3^er's  door  she  lays  her  head. 

And,  pinch'd  with  cold  and  shrinking  from  the  shower, 

"With  heavy  heart  deplores  that  luckless  hour, 

When  idly  first,  ambitious  of  the  town, 

She  left  her  wheel  and  robes  of  country  brown. 

Do  thine,  sweet  Auburn,   thine,  the  loveliest  train, 
Do  thy  fair  tribes  participate  her  pain  ? 
E'en  now,  perhaps,  by  cold  and  hunger  led. 
At  proud  men's  doors  they  ask  a  little  bread  ! 

Ah,  no.     To  distant  climes,  a  dreary  scene. 
Where  half  the  convex  world  intrudes  between, 


TEE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  141 

Through  torrid  tracts  with  fainting  steps  they  go, 

Where  wild  Altama  *  murmurs  to  their  woe. 

Far  different  there  from  all  that  charm'd  before, 

The  various  terrors  of  that  horrid  shore  ; 

Those  blazing  suns  that  dart  a  downward  ray, 

And  fiercely  shed  intolerable  day  ; 

Those  matted  woods,  where  birds  forget  to  sing, 

But  silent  bats  in  drowsy  clusters  cling  ; 

Those  poisonous  fields,  with  rank  luxuriance  crown'd, 

Where  the  dark  scorpion  gathers  death  around ; 

Where  at  each  step  the  stranger  fears  to  wake 

The  rattling  terrors  of  the  vengeful  snake ; 

Where  crouching  tigers  wait  their  hapless  prey. 

And  savage  men,  more  murd'rous  still  than  they ; 

While  oft  in  whirls  the  mad  tornado  flies, 

Mingling  the  ravaged  landscape  with  the  skies. 

Far  different  these  from  every  former  scene, 

The  cooling  brook,  the  grassy-vested  green. 

The  breezy  covert  of  the  warbling  grove, 

That  only  shelter'd  thefts  of  harmless  love. 

Good  Heaven  !  what  sorrows  gloom'd  that  parting 
day 
That  caird  them  from  their  native  walks  away ; 
When  the  poor  exiles,  every  pleasure  past. 
Hung  round  their  bowers,  and  fondly  look'd  their  last. 
And  took  a  long  farewell,  and  wish'd  in  vain 
For  seats  like  these  beyond  the  western  main ; 
And,  shuddering  still  to  face  the  distant  deep, 
Return'd  and  wept,  and  still  return'd  to  weep ! 

*The   Altama  (or  Altamaha)  is  a   river  iu  Georgia,  Uuited 
States. 


142  THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE. 

The  good  old  sire,  the  first  prepared  to  go 

To  new-found  worlds,  and  wept  for  others'  woe ; 

But  for  himself,  in  conscious  virtue  brave, 

He  only  wish'd  for  worlds  beyond  the  grave : 

His  lovely  daughter,  lovelier  in  her  tears, 

The  fond  companion  of  his  helpless  years. 

Silent  went  next,  neglectful  of  her  charms, 

And  left  a  lover's  for  a  father's  arms : 

With  louder  plaints  the  mother  spoke  her  woes. 

And  blest  the  cot  where  every  pleasure  rose  ; 

And  kiss'd  her  thoughtless  babes  with  many  a  tear, 

And  clasped  them  close,  in  sorrow  doubly  dear; 

Whilst  her  fond  husband  strove  to  lend  relief 

In  all  the  silent  manliness  of  grief. 

O,  luxury !  thou  curst  by  Heaven's  decree, 
How  ill  exchanged  are  things  like  these  for  thee ! 
How  do  thy  potions,  with  insidious  joy, 
Diffuse  their  pleasures  only  to  destroy  ! 
Kingdoms  by  thee,  to  sickly  greatness  grown, 
Boast  of  a  florid  vigor  not  their  own : 
At  every  draught  more  large  and  large  they  grow, 
A  bloated  mass  of  rank  unwieldy  woe ; 
Till,  sapp'd  their  strength,  and  every  part  unsound, 
Down,  down  they  sink,  and  spread  a  ruin  round. 

E'en  now  the  devastation  is  begun, 
And  half  the  business  of  destruction  done ; 
E'en  now,  methinks,  as  pond'ring  here  I  stand, 
I  see  the  rural  virtues  leave  the  land. 
Down  where  yon  anchoring  vessel  spreads  the  sail, 
That  idly  waiting  flaps  with  every  gale. 
Downward  they  move,  a  melancholy  band, 


THE  DESERTED  VILLAGE.  143 

Pass  from  the  shore,  and  darken  all  the  strand  t 
Contented  toil,  and  hospitable  care, 
And  kind  connubial  tenderness  are  there; 
And  piety,  with  wishes  placed  above, 
And  steady  loyalty,  and  faithful  love. 
And  thou,  sweet  Poetry,  thou  loveliest  maid, 
Still  first  to  fly  where  sensual  joys  invade ; 
Unfit,  in  these  degenerate  times  of  shame, 
To  catch  the  heart,  or  strike  for  honest  fame ; 
Dear,  charming  nymph,  neglected  and  decried, 
My  shame  in  crowds,  my  solitary  pride  ; 
Thou  source  of  all  my  bliss,  and  all  my  woe, 
That  found'st  me  poor  at  first,  and  keepst  me  so; 
Thou  guide  by  which  the  nobler  arts  excel, 
Thou  nurse  of  every  virtue,  fare  thee  well ! 
Farewell ;  and  O  !  where'er  thy  voice  be  tried. 
On  Torno's  cliffs,  or  Pambamarca's  side,* 
Whether  where  equinoctial  fervors  glow, 
Or  winter  wraps  the  polar  world  m  snow, 
Still  let  thy  voice,  prevailing  over  time, 
Redress  the  rigors  of  th'  inclement  clime ; 
Aid  slighted  truth  with  thy  persuasive  strain ; 
Teach  erring  man  to  spurn  the  rage  of  gain ; 
Teach  him,  that  states  of  native  strength  possess'd, 
Though  very  poor,  may  still  be  very  blessed  ; 

*  That  trade's  proud  empire  hastes  to  swift  decay, 

*  As  ocean  sweeps  the  labor'd  mole  away ; 

*  While  self-dependent  power  can  time  defy, 

*  As  rocks  resist  the  billows  and  the  sky.f 

*  Tornea,  Gulf  of  Bothnia,  Sweden.  Pambamarca  is  said  to  be 
a  mountain  near  Quito,  South  America. 

t  The  four  Hues  marked  witli  an  asterisk  were  vvritten  by  Dr. 
Johnson,  according  to  Bos  well. 


THE  TRAVELLER; 

OR, 

A  PROSPECT  OF  SOCIETY. 


DEDICATION. 


To  the  Rev.  Henry  Ooldsmith. 

Dear  Sm :  I  am  sensible  that  the  friendship  between 
us  can  acquire  no  new  force  from  the  ceremonies  of  a 
Dedication ;  and  perhaps  it  demands  an  excuse  thus 
to  prefix  your  name  to  my  attempts,  which  you  de- 
cline giving  with  your  own.  But  as  a  part  of  this 
poem  was  formerly  written  to  you  from  Switzerland, 
the  whole  can  now,  with  propriety,  be  only  inscribed 
to  you.  It  will  also  throw  a  light  upon  many  parts 
of  it,  when  the  reader  understands  that  it  is  addressed 
to  a  man  who,  despising  fame  and  fortune,  has  retired 
early  to  happiness  and  obscurity,  with  an  income  of 
forty  pounds  a  year. 

I  now  perceive,  my  dear  brother,  the  wisdom  of 
your  humble  choice.  You  have  entered  upon  a  sacred 
office,  where  the  harvest  is  great,  and  the  laborers 
are  but  few ;  while  you  have  left  the  field  of  ambi- 
tion, where  the  laborers  are  many,  and  the  harvest 
not  worth  carrying  away.  But  of  all  kinds  of  ambi- 
tion— what  from  the  refinement  of  the  times,  from 
different  systems  of  criticism,  and  from  the  divisions  of 
party — that  which  pursi^es  poetical  fame  is  the  wildest.* 

*This  passage  the  author  altered  twice.  In  the  first  edition  it 
appears  thus :  "  But  of  all  ^inds  of  ambition,  as  things  are  now 

147 

2a— G  &  Q—Q 


148  DEDICATION. 

Poetry  makes  a  principal  amusement  among  unpol- 
ished nations ;  but  in  a  country  verging  to  the  ex- 
tremes of  refinement,  painting  and  music  comes  in 
for  a  share.  As  these  offer  the  feeble  mind  a  less 
laborious  entertainment,  they  at  first  rival  poetry, 
and  at  length  supplant  her ;  they  engross  all  that 
favor  once  shown  to  her,  and  though  but  younger 
sisters,  seize  upon  the  elder's  birthright. 

Yet,  however  this  art  may  be  neglected  by  the 
powerful,  it  is  still  in  greater  danger  from  the  mis- 
taken efforts  of  the  learned  to  improve  it.  "What 
criticisms  have  we  not  heard  of  late  in  favor  of  blank 
verse  and  Pindaric  odes,  choruses,  anapests  and 
iambics,  alliterative  care  and  happy  negligence ! 
Every  absurdity  has  now  a  champion  to  defend  it ; 
and  as  he  is  generally  much  in  the  wrong,  so  he  has 
always  much  to  say  ;  for  error  is  ever  talkative. 

But  there  is  an  enemy  to  this  art  still  more  dan- 
gerous,— I  mean  party.  Party  entirely  distorts  the 
judgment,  and  destroys  the  taste.  "When  the  mind  is 
once  infected  with  this  disease,  it  can  only  find  pleas- 
ure in  what  contributes  to  increase  the  distemper. 
Like  the  tiger  that  seldom  desists  from  pursuing  man 
after  having  once  preyed  upon  human  flesh,  the  reader 

cii'cumstanced,  perhaps  that  which  pursues  poetical  fame  is  the 
wildest.  What  from  the  increased  refinement  of  the  times, 
from  the  diversity  of  judgments  produced  by  opposing  criti- 
cism, and  from  the  more  prevalent  opinion  influenced  by  party, 
the  strongest  and  happiest  efforts  can  expect  to  please  but  in  a 
very  narrow  circle.  [Though  the  poet  were  as  sure  of  his  aim 
as  the  imperial  archer  of  antiquity,  who  boasted  that  he  never 
missed  the  heart,  yet  would  many  of  his  shafts  now  fly  at  ran- 
dom, for  the  heart  too  often  is  in  the  wrong  place."]  In  the 
second  edition  the  bracketed  paragraph  was  cut  off  ;  aud  in  the 
sixth  the  fi.nal  curtailment  was  effected, 


DEDICATION.  149 

who  has  once  gratified  his  appetite  with  calumny 
makes  ever  after  the  most  agreeable  feast  upon  mur- 
dered reputation.  Such  readers  generally  admire 
some  half-witted  thing,  who  wants  to  be  thought  a 
bold  man,  having  lost  the  character  of  a  wise  one. 
Him  they  dignify  with  the  name  of  poet ;  his  tawdry  * 
lampoons  are  called  satires ;  his  turbulence  is  said  to 
be  force,  and  his  frenzy  fire. 

What  reception  a  poem  may  find,  which  has  neither 
abuse,  party,  nor  blank  verse  to  support  it,  I  cannot 
tell,  nor  am  I  solicitous  to  know.  My  aims  are 
right.  Without  espousing  the  cause  of  any  party,  I 
have  attempted  to  moderate  the  rage  of  all.  I  have 
endeavored  to  show,  that  there  may  be  equal  happi- 
ness in  states  that  are  differently  governed  from  our 
own ;  that  every  state  has  a  particular  principle  of 
happiness,  and  that  this  principle  in  each  [state,  and 
in  our  own  in  particular  f]  may  be  carried  to  a  mis- 
chievous excess.  There  are  few  can  judge  better  than 
yourself  how  far  these  positions  are  illustrated  in  this 
Poem. 

I  am,  dear  sir. 

Your  most  affectionate  brother, 

Oliver  Goldsmith. 


*This  wordy  "  tawdry  "  was  first  given  in  the  sixth  edition. 
Goldsmith  is  thought  to  have  had  Churchill  in  his  mind  in  this 
sketch. 

'  In  the  first  five  editions. 


THE  TRAYELLEE. 


Remote,  unfriended,  melancholy,  slow, 
Or  by  the  lazy  Scheld,  or  wandering  Po ; 
Or  onward,  where  the  rude  Carinthian  boor 
Against  the  houseless  stranger  shuts  the  door; 
Or  where  Campania's  plain  forsaken  lies, 
A  weary  waste  expanding  to  the  skies  : 
"Where'er  I  roam,  whatever  realms  to  see, 
My  heart  untravell'd  fondly  turns  to  thee ; 
Still  to  my  brother  turns,  with  ceaseless  pain, 
And  drags  at  each  remove  a  lengthening  chain. 

Eternal  blessings  crown  my  earliest  friend, 
And  round  his  dwelling  guardian  saints  attend: 
Blest  be  the  spot,  where  cheerful  guests  retire 
To  pause  from  toil,  and  trim  their  ev'ning  fire ; 
Blest  that  abode,  where  want  and  pain  repair, 
And  every  stranger  finds  a  ready  chair ; 
Blest  be  those  feasts  with  simple  plenty  crown'd, 
"Where  all  the  ruddy  family  round 
Laugh  at  the  jests  or  pranks  that  never  fail. 
Or  sigh  with  pity  at  some  mournful  tale. 
Or  press  the  bashful  stranger  to  his  food, 
And  learn  the  luxury  of  doing  good  I 

151 


152  THE  TRAVELLER. 

But  me,  not  destin'd  such  delights  to  share, 
My  prime  of  life  in  wandering  spent  and  care, 
Impell'd  with  steps  unceasing,  to  pursue 
Some  fleeting  good,  that  mocks  me  with  the  view ; 
That,  like  the  circle  bounding  earth  and  skies, 
Allures  from  far,  yet,  as  I  follow,  flies ; 
My  fortune  leads  to  traverse  realms  alone, 
And  find  no  spot  of  all  the  world  my  own. 

E'en  now,  where  Alpine  solitudes  ascend, 
I  sit  me  down  a  pensive  hour  to  spend ; 
And,  plac'd  on  high  above  the  storm's  career. 
Look  downward  where  a  hundred  realms  appear ; 
Lakes,  forests,  cities,  plains  extending  wide. 
The  pomp  of  kings,  the  shepherd's  humbler  pride. 

When  thus  Creation's  charms  around  combine. 
Amidst  the  store,  should  thankless  pride  repine? 
Say,  should  the  philosophic  mind  disdain 
That  good  which  makes  each  humbler  bosom  vain  ? 
Let  school-taught  pride  dissemble  all  it  can. 
These  little  things  are  great  to  little  man  ; 
And  wiser  he,  whose  sympathetic  mind 
Exults  in  all  the  good  of  all  mankind. 
Ye  glitt'ring  towns,  with  wealth  and  splendor  crown'd ; 
Ye  fields,  where  summer  spread  profusion  round. 
Ye  lakes,  whose  vessels  catch  the  busy  gale, 
Ye  bending  swains,  that  dress  the  flow'ry  vale, 
For  me  your  tributary  stores  combine  ; 
Creation's  heir,  the  world,  the  world  is  mine ! 

As  some  lone  miser,  visiting  his  store. 
Bends  at  his  treasure,  counts,  recounts  it  o'er ; 
Hoards  after  hoards  his  rising  raptures  fill. 
Yet  still  he  sighs,  for  hoards  are  wanting  still : 


THE  TRAVELLER.  153 

Thus  to  my  breast  alternate  passions  rise, 

Pleas'd  with  each  good  that  heaven  to  man  supplies : 

Yet  oft  a  sigh  prevails,  and  sorrows  fall. 

To  see  the  hoard  of  human  bliss  so  small ; 

And  oft  1  wish,  amidst  the  scene  to  find 

Some  spot  to  real  happiness  consign'd, 

Where  my  worn  soul,  each  wand'ring  hope  at  rest, 

May  gather  bliss  to  see  my  fellows  blest. 

But  where  to  find  that  happiest  spot  below 
Who  can  direct,  when  all  pretend  to  know  ? 
The  shudd'ring  tenant  of  the  frigid  zone 
Boldly  proclaims  that  happiest  spot  his  own, 
Extols  the  treasures  of  his  stormy  seas, 
And  his  long  nights  of  revelry  and  ease : 
The  naked  negro,  panting  at  the  Line, 
Boasts  of  his  golden  sands  and  palmy  wine. 
Basks  in  the  glare,  or  stems  the  tepid  wave. 
And  thanks  his  gods  for  all  the  good  they  gave.} 
Such  is  the  patriot's  boast  where'er  we  roam, 
His  first,  best  country,  ever  is  at  home. 
And  yet,  perhaps,  if  countries  we  compare, 
And  estimate  the  blessings  which  they  share, 
Though  patriots  flatter,  still  shall  wisdom  find . 
An  equal  portion  dealt  to  all  mankind  ; 
As  different  good,  by  art  or  nature  given, 
To  different  nations  makes  their  blessing  even. 

Nature,  a  mother  kind  alike  to  all. 
Still  grants  her  bliss  at  Labor's  earnest  call ; 
With  food  as  well  the  peasant  is  supplied 
On  Lira's  cliffs  as  Arno's  shelvy  side  ; 
And  though  the  rocky  crested  summits  frown, 
These  rocks  by  custom  turn  to  beds  of  down. 


154  TEE  TRAVELLER. 

From  art  more  various  are  the  blessings  sent, 

Wealth,  commerce,  honor,  liberty,  content. 

Yet  these  each  other's  power  so  strong  contest. 

That  either  seems  destructive  of  the  rest. 

"Where  wealth  and  freedom  reign,  contentment  fails, 

And  honor  sinks  where  commerce  long  prevails. 

Hence  every  state,  to  one  loved  blessing  prone. 

Conforms  and  models  life  to  that  alone. 

Each  to  the  favorite  happiness  attends. 

And  spurns  the  plan  that  aims  at  other  ends ; 

'Till  carried  to  excess  in  each  domain. 

This  favorite  good  begets  peculiar  pain. 

But  let  us  try  these  truths  with  closer  eyes, 
And  trace  them  through  the  prospect  as  it  lies ; 
Here,  for  a  while,  my  proper  cares  resign'd. 
Here  let  me  sit  in  sorrow  for  mankind  ; 
Like  yon  neglected  shrub  at  random  cast. 
That  shades  the  steep,  and  sighs  at  every  blast. 

Far  to  the  right,  where  Apennine  ascends, 
Bright  as  the  summer,  Italy  extends ; 
Its  uplands  sloping  deck  the  mountain's  side  ; 
Woods  over  woods  in  gay  theatric  pride  ; 
While  oft  some  temple's  mold'ring  tops  between 
With  venerable  grandeur  mark  the  scene. 

Could  Nature's  bounty  satisfy  the  breast. 
The  sons  of  Italy  were  surely   blest : 
Whatever  fruits  in  different  climes  are  found, 
That  proudly  rise,  or  humbly  court  the  ground ; 
Whatever  blooms  in  torrid  tracts  appear, 
Whose  bright  succession  decks  the  varied  year ; 
Whatever  sweets  salute  the  northern  sky 
With  vernal  lives,  that  blossom  but  to  die ; 


THE  TRAVELLER.  155 

These  here  disporting  own  the  kindred  soil, 
Nor  ask  luxuriance  from  the  planter's  toil  ; 
While  sea-born  gales  their  gelid  wings  expand, 
To  winnow  fragrance  round  the  smiling  land. 

But  small  the  bliss  that  sense  alone  bestows, 
And  sensual  bliss  is  all  the  nation  knows. 
In  florid  beauty  groves  and  fields  appear, 
Man  seems  the  only  growth  that  dwindles  here. 
Contrasted  faults  through  all  his  manners  reign  : 
Though  poor,  luxurious  ;  though  submissive,  vain  ; 
Though  grave,  yet  trifling  ;  zealous,  yet  untrue, 
And  e'en  in  penance  planning  sins  anew. 
All  evils  here  contaminate  the  mind. 
That  opulence  departed  leaves  behind ; 
For  wealth  was  theirs  ;  not  far  remov'd  the  date. 
When  commerce  proudly  flourish'd  through  the  state : 
At  her  command  the  palace  learn'd  to  rise, 
Again  the  long-fall'n  column  sought  the  skies, 
The  canvas  glow'd  beyond  e'en  nature  warm. 
The  pregnant  quarry  teem'd  with  human  form : 
Till,  more  unsteady  than  the  southern  gale, 
Commerce  on  other  shores  display'd  her  sail ; 
While  nought  remain'd,  of  all  that  riches  gave, 
But  towns  unmann'd,  and  lords  without  a  slave; 
And  late  the  nation  found,  with  fruitless  skill, 
Its  former  strength  was  but  plethoric  ill. 

Yet,  still  the  loss  of  wealth  is  here  supplied 
By  arts,  the  splendid  wrecks  of  former  pride : 
From  these  the  feeble  heart  and  long  fall'n  mind 
An  easy  compensation  seem  to  find. 
Here  may  be  seen,  in  bloodless  pomp  array'd, 
The  pasteboard  triumph  and  the  cavalcade  ; 


156  TEE  TRAVELLER. 

Processions  form'd  for  piety  and  love, 

A  mistress  or  a  saint  in  every  grove. 

By  sports  like  these  are  all  their  cares  beguil'd ; 

The  sports  of  children  satisfy  the  child. 

Each  nobler  aim,  repress'd  by  long  control, 

!Now  sinks  at  last,  or  feebly  mans  the  soul ; 

While  low  delights  succeeding  fast  behind. 

In  happier  meanness  occupy  the  mind : 

As  in  those  domes  where  Caesars  once  bore  sway, 

Defac'd  by  time,  and  tottering  in  decay. 

There  in  the  ruin,  heedless  of  the  dead. 

The  shelter-seeking  peasant  builds  his  shed  : 

And,  wond'ring  man  could  want  the  larger  pile, 

Exults,  and  owns  his  cottage  with  a  smile. 

My  soul,  turn  from  them !  turn  we  to  survey 
Where  rougher  climes  a  nobler  race  display. 
Where  the  bleak  Swiss  their  stormy  mansions  tread,  \ 
And  force  a  churlish  soil  for  scanty  bread : 
No  product  here  the  barren  hills  afford, 
But  man  and  steel,  the  soldier  and  his  sword  ; 
No  vernal  blooms  their  torpid  rocks  array. 
But  winter  ling'ring  chills  the  lap  of  May  ; 
No  zephyr  fondly  sues  the  mountain's  breast, 
But  meteors  glare,  and  stormy  glooms  invest. 

Yet  still,  e'en  here,  content  can  spread  a  charm, 
Kedress  the  clime,  and  all  its  rage  disarm. 
Though  poor  the  peasant's  hut,  his  feasts  though  small, 
He  sees  his  little  lot  the  lot  of  all ; 
Sees  no  contiguous  palace  rear  its  head 
To  shame  the  meanness  of  his  humble  shed ; 
No  costly  lord  the  sumptuous  banquet  deal, 
To  make  him  loathe  his  vegetable  meal ; 


TEE  TRAVELLER.  157 

But  calm,  and  bred  in  ignorance  and  toil, 
Each  wish  contracting,  tits  him  to  the  soil. 
Cheerful,  at  morn,  he  wakes  from  short  repose, 
Breasts  the  keen  air,  and  carols  as  he  goes ; 
With  patient  angle  trolls  the  iinny  deep. 
Or  drives  his  vent'rous  ploughshare  to  the  steep ; 
Or  seeks  the  den  where  snow-tracks  mark  the  way 
And  drags  the  struggling  savage  into  day. 
At  night  returning,  every  labor  sped. 
He  sits  him  down  the  monarch  of  a  shed ; 
Smiles  by  his  cheerful  fire,  and  round  surveys 
His  children's  looks  that  brighten  at  the  blaze ; 
"While  his  lov'd  partner,  boastful  of  her  hoard, 
Displays  her  cleanly  platter  on  the  board ; 
And  haply,  too,  some  pilgrim,  thither  led. 
With  many  a  tale  repays  the  nightly  bed. 

Thus  every  good  his  native  wilds  impart. 
Imprints  the  patriot  passion  on  his  heart ; 
And  e'en  those  ills  that  round  his  mansion  rise, 
Enhance  the  bliss  his  scanty  fund  supplies. 
Dear  is  that  shed  to  w^hich  his  soul  conforms. 
And  dear  that  hill  which  lifts  him  to  the  storms; 
And  as  a  child,  w^hen  scaring  sounds  molest. 
Clings  close  and  closer  to  the  mother's  breast, 
So  the  loud  torrent,  and  the  whirlwind's  roar, 
But  bind  him  to  his  native  mountains  more. 

Such  are  the  charms  to  barren  states  assign'd : 
Their  wants  but  few,  their  wishes  all  confin'd, 
Yet  let  them  only  share  the  praises  due, — 
H  few  their  wants,  their  pleasures  are  but  few : 
For  every  want  that  stimulates  the  breast. 
Becomes  a  source  of  pleasure  when  redrest. 


158  THE  TRAVELLER. 

Hence  from  such  lands  each  pleasing  science  flies, 
That  first  excites  desire,  and  then  supplies ; 
Unknown  to  them,  when  sensual  pleasures  cloy, 
To  till  the  languid  pause  with  finer  joy ; 
Unknown  those  powers  that  raise  the  soul  to  flame, 
Catch  every  nerve,  and  vibrate  through  the  frame. 
Their  level  life  is  but  a  smold'ring  fire, 
Unquench'd  by  want,  unf ann'd  by  strong  desire ; 
Unfit  for  raptures,  or,  if  raptures  cheer 
On  some  high  festival  of  once  a  year, 
In  wild  excess  the  vulgar  breast  takes  fire, 
Till,  buried  in  debauch,  the  bliss  expire. 

But  not  their  joys  alone  thus  coarsely  flow,— i- 
Their  morals,  like  their  pleasures,  are  but  low ; 
For,  as  refinement  stops,  from  sire  to  son 
Unalter'd,  unimproved  the  manners  run  ; 
And  love's  and  friendship's  finely  pointed  dart 
Fall  blunted  from  each  indurated  heart. 
Some  sterner  virtues  o'er  the  mountain's  breast 
May  sit,  like  falcons  cow'ring  on  the  nest ; 
But  all  the  gentler  morals, — such  as  play 
Through   life's  more   cultur'd  walks,  and  charm  the 

way,— 
These,  far  dispers'd,  on  timorous  pinions  fly 
To  sport  and  flutter  in  a  kinder  sky. 

To  kinder  skies,  where  gentler  manners  reign, 
I  turn  ;  and  France  displays  her  bright  domain. 
Gay,  sprightly  land  of  mirth  and  social  ease, 
Pleas'd  with  thyself,  whom  all  the  world  can  please, 
How  often  have  I  led  thy  sportive  choir. 
With  tuneless  pipe  beside  the  murmuring  Loire ! 


THE  TRAVELLER.  159 

Where  shading  elms  along  the  margin  grew, 
And  freshen'd  from  the  wave,  the  zephyr  flew ; 
And  haply,  though  my  harsh  touch  falt'ring  still, 
But  mock'd  all  tune,  and  marr'd  the  dancer's  skill ; 
Yet  would  the  village  praise  my  wondrous  power, 
And  dance,  forgetful  of  the  noontide  hour. 
Alike  all  ages  :  dames  of  ancient  days 
Have  led  their  children  through  the  mirthful  maze ; 
And  the  gay  grandsire,  skilPd  in  gestic  lore, 
Has  frisk'd  beneath  the  burden  of  threescore. 

So  blest  a  life  these  thoughtless  realms  display; 
Thus  idly  busy  rolls  their  world  away  : 
Theirs  are  those  arts  that  mind  to  mind  endear, 
For  honor  forms  the  social  temper  here : 
Honor,  that  praise  which  real  merit  gains, 
Or  ev'n  imaginary  worth  obtains. 
Here  passes  current ;  paid  from  hand  to  hand, 
It  shifts  in  splendid  traflBc  round  the  land ; 
From  courts  to  camps,  to  cottages  it  strays, 
And  all  are  taught  an  avarice  of  praise : 
They  please,  are  pleas'd  ;  they  give  to  get  esteem ; 
Till,  seeming  blest,  they  grow  to  what  they  seem. 

But  while  this  softer  art  their  bliss  supplies, 
It  gives  their  follies  also  room  to  rise ; 
For  praise  too  dearly  lov'd,  or  warmly  sought, 
Enfeebles  all  eternal  strength  of  thought : 
And  the  weak  soul,  within  itself  unblest, 
Leans  for  all  pleasure  on  another's  breast. 
Hence  ostentation  here,  with  tawdry  art. 
Pants  for  the  vulgar  praise  which  fools  impart ; 
Here  vanity  assumes  her  pert  grimace. 
And  trims  her  robes  of  frieze  with  copper  lace ; 


160  THE  TRAVELLER. 

Here  beggar  pride  defrauds  her  daily  cheer, 
To  boast  one  splendid  banquet  once  a  year : 
The  mind  still  turns  where  shifting  fashion  draws, 
Nor  weighs  the  solid  worth  of  self-applause. 

To  men,  of  other  minds  my  fancy  flies, 
Embosom'd  in  the  deep  where  Holland  lies. 
Methinks  her  patient  sons  before  me  stand. 
Where  the  broad  ocean  leans  against  the  land, 
And,  sedulous  to  stop  the  coming  tide, 
Lift  the  tall  rampire's  artificial  pride. 
Onward,  methinks,  and  diligently  slow. 
The  firm  connected  bulwark  seems  to  grow. 
Spreads  its  long  arms  amidst  the  watery  roar, 
Scoops  out  an  empife,  and  usurps  the  shore ; 
While  the  pent  ocean,  rising  o'er  the  pile. 
Sees  an  amphibious  world  beneath  him  smile ; 
The  slow  canal,  the  yellow-blossom'd  vale, 
The  willow-tufted  bank,  the  gliding  sail, 
The  crowded  mart,  the  cultivated  plain, 
A  new  creation  rescued  from  his  reign. 

Thus,  while  around  the  wave-subjected  soil 
Impels  the  native  to  repeated  toil, 
Industrious  habits  in  each  bosom  reign. 
And  industry  begets  a  love  of  gain. 
Hence  all  the  good  from  opulence  that  springs, 
With  all  those  ills  superfluous  treasure  brings. 
Are  here  display'd.     Their  much-loved  wealth  imparts 
Convenience,  plenty,  elegance,  and  arts ; 
But  view  them  closer,  craft  and  fraud  appear ; 

Even  liberty  itself  is  barter'd  here  : 

At  gold's  superior  charms  all  freedom  flies, 
The  needy  sell  it,  and  the  rich  man  buys. 


THE  TRAVELLER.  161 

A  land  of  tyrants,  and  a  den  of  slaves, 
Here  wretches  seek  dishonorable  graves, 
And,  calmly  bent,  to  servitude  conform, 
Dull  as  their  lakes  that  slumber  in  the  storm. 

Heavens  !  how  unlike  their  Belgic  sires  of  old  I 
Eough,  poor,  content,  ungovernably  bold, 
War  in  each  breast,  and  freedom  on  each  brow, 
How  much  unlike  the  sons  of  Britain  now  ! 

Fired  at  the  sound,  my  genius  spreads  her  wing. 
And  flies  where  Britain  courts  the  western  spring ; 
"Where  lawns  extend  that  scorn  Arcadian  pride, 
And  brighter  streams  than  famed  Hydaspes  glide. 
There  all  around  the  gentlest  breezes  stray, 
There  gentle  music  melts  on  every  spray  ; 
Creation's  mildest  charms  are  there  combined, 
Extremes  are  only  in  the  master's  mind  ! 
Stern  o'er  each  bosom  Keason  holds  her  state, 
With  daring  aims  irregularly  great. 
Pride  in  their  port,  defiance  in  their  eye, 
1  see  the  lords  of  human  kind  pass  by  ; 
Intent  on  high  designs,  a  thoughtful  band. 
By  forms  unfashion'd,  fresh  from  Nature's  hand  ; 
Fierce  in  their  native  hardiness  of  soul, 
True  to  imagin'd  right,  above  control, — 
While  e'en  the  peasant  boasts  these  rights  to  scan, 
And  learns  to  venerate  himself  as  man. 

Thine,  Freedom,  thine  the  blessings  pictured  here, 
Thine  are  those  charms  that  dazzle  and  endear ! 
Too  blest  indeed  were  such  without  alloy  ; 
But  foster'd  e'en  by  Freedom,  ills  annoy  : 


162  THE  TRAVELLER. 

That  independence  Britons  prize  too  high, 
Keeps  man  from  man,  and  breaks  the  social  tie ; 
The  self-dependent  lordlings  stand  alone, 
All  claims  that  bind  and  sweeten  life  unknown ; 
Here,  by  the  bonds  of  nature  feebly  held, 
Mmds  combat  minds,  repelling  and  repell'd ; 
Ferments  arise,  imprison'd  factions  roar, 
Represt  ambition  struggles  round  her  shore ; 
Till,  overwrought,  the  general  system  feels 
Its  motion  stop,  or  frenzy  fire  the  wheels. 

Nor  this  the  worst.     As  Nature's  ties  decay, 
As  duty,  love,  and  honor  fail  to  sway. 
Fictitious  bonds,  the  bonds  of  wealth  and  law, 
Still  gather  strength,  and  force  unwilling  awe. 
Hence  all  obedience  bows  to  these  alone. 
And  talent  sinks,  and  merit  weeps  unknown  : 
Till  time  may  come,  when,  stripped  of  all  her  charms, 
The  land  of  scholars,  and  the  nurse  of  arms, 
"Where  noble  stems  transmit  the  patriot  flame. 
Where  kings  have  toil'd,  and  poets  wrote  for  fame, 
One  sink  of  level  avarice  shall  lie. 
And  scholars,  soldiers,  kings,  unhonor'd  die. 

Yet  think  not,  thus  when  Freedom's  ills  I  state, 
I  mean  to  flatter  kings,  or  court  the  great : 
Ye  powers  of  truth,  that  bid  my  soul  aspire. 
Far  from  my  bosom  drive  the  low  desire  ! 
And  thou,  fair  Freedom,  taught  alike  to  feel 
The  rabble's  rage,  and  tyrant's  angry  steel ; 
Thou  transitory  flower,  alike  undone 
By  proud  contempt,  or  favor's  fostering  sun — 
Still  may  thy  blooms  the  changeful  clime  endure, 
I  only  would  repress  them  to  secure  ! 


THE  TRAVELLER.  163 

For  just  experience  tells,  in  every  soil, 
That  those  who  think  must  govern  those  that  toil ; 
And  all  that  Freedom's  highest  aims  can  reach, 
Is  but  to  lay  proportion'd  loads  on  each. 
Hence,  should  one  order  disproportion'd  grow, 
Its  double  weight  must  ruin  all  below. 

O,  then,  how  blind  to  all  that  truth  requires, 
Who  think  it  freedom  when  a  part  aspires  ! 
Calm  is  my  soul,  nor  apt  to  rise  in  arms. 
Except  when  fast  approaching  danger  warms : 
But  when  contending  chiefs  blockade  the  throne^ ) 
Contracting  regal  power  to  stretch  their  own  ; 
"When  I  behold  a  factious  band  agree 
To  call  it  freedom  when  themselves  are  free ; 
Each  wanton  judge  new  penal  statutes  draw. 
Laws  grind  the  poor,  and  rich  men  rule  the  law ; 
The  wealth  of  climes,  where  savage  nations  roam, 
Pillag'd  from  slaves  to  purchase  slaves  at  home, — 
Fear,  pity,  justice,  indignation,  start, 
Tear  oif  reserve,  and  bare  my  swelling  heart ; 
'Till,  half  a  patriot,  half  a  coward  grown, 
I  fly  from  petty  tyrants  to  the  throne. 

Yes,  brother,  curse  with  me  that  baleful  hour, 
When  first  ambition  struck  at  regal  power  ; 
And  thus,  polluting  honor  in  its  source. 
Gave  wealth  to  sway  the  mind  with  double  force. 
Have  we  not  seen,  round  Britain's  peopled  shore, 
Her  useful  sons  exchang'd  for  useless  ore  ? 
Seen  all  her  triumphs  but  destruction  haste, 
Like  flaring  tapers  brightening  as  they  waste  ? 
Seen  Opulence,  her  grandeur  to  maintain, 
Lead  stern  Depopulation  in  her  train. 


164  THE  TRAVELLER. 

And  over  fields  where  scatter'd  hamlets  rose, 
In  barren,  solitary  pomp  repose? 
Have  we  not  seen,  at  pleasure's  lordly  call, 
The  smiling,  long  frequented  village  fall  ?  * 
Behold  the  duteous  son,  the  sire  decay'd, 
The  modest  matron,  and  the  blushing  maid, 
Forced  from  their  homes,  a  melancholy  train, 
To  traverse  climes  beyond  the  western  main, 
Where  wild  Oswego  spreads  her  swamps  around, 
And  Niagra  f  stuns  with  thund'ring  sound  ? 

E'en  now,  perhaps,  as  there  some  pilgrim  strays 
Through  tangled  forests,  and  through  dangerous  ways. 
Where  beasts  with  man  divided  empire  claim. 
And  the  brown  Indian  marks  with  murderous  aim ; 
There,  while  above  the  giddy  tempest  flies, 
And  all  around  distressful  yells  arise. 
The  pensive  exile,  bending  with  his  woe, 
*  To  stop  too  fearful,  and  too  faint  to  go, 
Casts  a  long  look  where  England's  glories  shine, 
And  bids  his  bosom  sympathize  with  mine. 

Vain,  very  vain,  my  weary  search  to  find 
That  bliss  which  only  centres  in  the  mind : 
Why  have  I  stray'd  from  pleasure  and  repose, 
To  seek  a  good  each  government  bestows  ? 
In  every  government,  though  terrors  reign. 
Though  tyrant  kings,  or  tyrant  laws  restrain, 

*  This  passage  is  viewed  by  several  editors  as  disclosing  the 
same  theme  as  that  which  inspired  the  "Deserted  Village," 
published  five  years  later.  Sir  James  Prior  points  to  "Have  not 
we  "  (the  author  addressing  his  brother)  as  evidence  that  Auburn 
was  an  Irish  village. 

t  Niagara,  it  will  be  observed.  This,  Prior  says,  was  the  old 
pronunciation  of  the  name  of  the  American  river. 


THE  TRAVELLER.  165 

*  How  small,  of  all  that  human  hearts  endure, 

*  That  part  which  laws  or  kings  can  cause  or  cure ! 

*  Still  to  ourselves  in  every  place  consign'd, 

*  Our  own  felicity  we  make  or  find  : 

*  With  secret  course,  which  no  loud  storms  annoy, 

*  Glides  the  smooth  current  of  domestic  joy. 
The  lifted  axe,  the  agonizing  wheel, 

Luke's  *  iron  crown,  and  Damien's  f  bed  of  steel, 

*  To  men  remote  from  power  but  rarely  known, 

*  Leave  reason,  faith,  and  conscience,  all  our  own.  % 

*  In  1514,  two  brothers,  Luke  and  George  Zeck,  headed  a  des- 
perate rebellion  in  Hungary.  When  it  was  quelled,  Geoi'ge,  not 
Luke,  was  punished  by  having  his  head  encircled  with  a  red-hot 
crown,  in  mockery  of  his  supposed  ambitious  views.— B.  The 
real  name  of  the  brothers  seems  to  have  been  Dosa.  Forster 
says  they  were  of  the  race  of  the  Szeklers,  or  Zecklers,  of 
Transylvania.  Bolton  Corney  has  on  this  account  substituted 
"Zeck's"  for  "Luke's"  in  the  poem. 

t  Robert  Francis  Damien,  a  mad  fanatic,  who,  in  1757,  made 
an  attempt  to  assassinate  Louis  XV  of  France.  He  was  put 
to  the  most  exquisite  tortures,  and  at  last  torn  to  pieces  by 
horses. — B. 

X  The  nine  lines  to  which  an  asterisk  is  prefixed  were  written 
by  Dr.  Johnson,  when  the  poem  was  submitted  to  his  friendly 
revision,  previous  to  publication. 


THE  HERMIT. 

A  BALLAD. 


The  following  letter,  addressed  to  the  printer  of  the  St.  James's 
Chronicle,  appeared  in  that  paper  in  June,  1767. 

Sir, — As  there  is  nothing  I  dislike  so  much  as  news- 
paper controversy,  particularly  upon  trifles,  permit  me 
to  be  as  concise  as  possible  in  informing  a  correspond- 
ent of  yours,  that  1  recommended  Blainville's  Travels, 
because  I  thought  the  book  was  a  good  one,  and  I 
think  so  still.  I  said  I  was  told  by  the  bookseller  that 
it  was  then  first  published,  but  in  that  it  seems  1  was 
misinformed,  and  my  reading  was  not  extensive  enough 
to  set  me  right. 

Another  correspondent  of  yours  accuses  me  of  having 
taken  a  ballad  I  published  some  time  ago,  from  one* 
by  the  ingenious  Mr.  Percy.  I  do  not  think  there  is 
any  great  resemblance  between  the  two  pieces  in  ques- 
tion. If  there  be  any  his  ballad  is  taken  from  mine. 
I  read  it  to  Mr,  Percy  some  years  ago  ;  and  he  (as  we 
both  considered  these  things  as  trifles  at  best)  told  me 
with  his  usual  good  humor  the  next  time  I  saw  him, 
that  he  had  taken  my  plan  to  form  the  fragments  of 

*  Friar  of  Orders  Gray.  Reliqiies  of  Ancient  Poetry,  vol.  i, 
book  2,  No.  17. 

167 


168  THE  HERMIT. 

Shakspeare  into  a  ballad  of  his  own.  He  then  read 
me  his  little  Cento,  if  I  may  so  call  it,  and  I  highly 
approved  it.  Such  petty  anecdotes  as  these  are  scarcely 
worth  printing ;  and,  were  it  not  for  the  busy  disposi- 
tion of  some  of  your  correspondents,  the  public  should 
never  have  known  that  he  owes  me  the  hint  of  his 
ballad,  or  that  I  am  obliged  to  his  friendship  and  learn- 
ing for  communications  of  a  much  more  important 
nature. 

I  am,  Sir,  yours,  etc., 

OuvEB  Goldsmith. 


THE  HEKMIT. 

**  TuKN,  gentle  Hermit  of  the  dale, 
And  guide  my  lonely  way, 

To  where  yon  taper  cheers  the  vale 
With  hospitable  ray. 

For  here  forlorn  and  lost  I  tread, 
With  fainting  steps  and  slow, 

Where  wilds,  immeasurably  spread, 
Seem  length'ning  as  I  go." 

"  Forbear,  my  son,"  the  Hermit  cries, 
"  To  tempt  the  dangerous  gloom ; 

For  yonder  faithless  phantom  flies 
To  lure  thee  to  thy  doom. 

"  Here  to  the  houseless  child  of  want 

My  door  is  open  still; 
And  though  my  portion  is  but  scant, 

I  give  it  with  good  will. 

"  Then  turn  to-night,  and  freely  share 
Whate'er  my  cell  bestows ; 

My  rushy  couch  and  frugal  fare, 
My  blessing  and  repose. 


169 


170  TEE  HERMIT. 

"  ]No  flocks  that  range  the  valley  free, 
To  slaughter  I  condemn ; 

Taught  by  that  Power  that  pities  me, 
I  learn  to  pity  them ; 

"  But  from  the  mountain's  grassy  side, 
A  guiltless  feast  I  bring  ; 

A  script  with  herbs  and  fruits  supplied, 
And  water  from  the  spring. 

"  Then,  pilgrim,  turn,  thy  cares  forego 
All  earth-born  cares  are  wrong : 

Man  wants  but  little  here  below, 
Nor  wants  that  little  long." 

Soft  as  the  dew  from  heaven  descends, 

His  gentle  accents  fell  : 
The  modest  stranger  lowly  bends, 

And  follows  to  the  cell. 

Far  in  the  wilderness  obscure. 

The  lonely  mansion  lay, 
A  refuge  to  the  neighb'ring  poor. 

And  strangers  led  astray. 

No  stores  beneath  its  humble  thatch 
Required  a  master's  care  ; 

The  wicket,  opening  with  a  latch, 
Received  the  harmless  pair. 

And  now,  when  busy  crowds  retire 
To  take  their  evening  rest, 

The  Hermit  trimm'd  his  little  fire, 
And  cheer'd  his  pensive  guest : 


THE  HERMIT.  171 

And  spread  his  vegetable  store, 

And  gaily  press'd  and  smiled ; 
And  skill'd  m  legendary  lore, 

The  lingering  hours  beguiled. 

Around,  in  sympathetic  mirth, 

Its  tricks  the  kitten  tries, 
The  cricket  chirrups  on  the  hearth, 

The  crackling  fagot  flies. 

But  nothing  could  a  charm  impart 

To  soothe  the  stranger's  woe ; 
For  grief  was  heavy  at  his  heart. 

And  tears  began  to  flow. 

His  rising  cares  the  Hermit  spied, 

"With  answering  care  oppress' d ; 
And,  "  Whence,  unhappy  youth,"  be  cried, 

"The  sorrows  of  thy  breast? 

"  From  better  habitations  spurn'd, 

Reluctant  dost  thou  rove  ? 
Or  grieve  for  friendship  unreturn'd, 

Or  unregarded  love  ? 

"  Alas !  the  joys  that  fortune  brings, 

Are  trifling,  and  decay  ; 
And  those  who  prize  the  paltry  things, 

More  trifling  still  than  they. 

"  And  what  is  friendship  but  a  name, 

A  charm  that  lulls  to  sleep  ; 
A  shade  that  follows  wealth  or  fame, 

But  leaves  the  wretch  to  weep  ? 

82— G  &  G— H 


172  THE  HERMIT. 

"  And  love  is  still  an  emptier  sound, 

The  modern  fair  one's  jest ; 
On  earth  unseen,  or  only  found 

To  warm  the  turtle's  nest. 

"  For  shame,  fond  youth,  thy  sorrows  hush, 

And  spurn  the  sex,"  he  said  ; 
But  while  he  spoke,  a  rising  blush 

His  love-lorn  guest  betray'd. 

Surprised,  he  sees  new  beauties  rise, 

Swift  mantling  to  the  view ; 
Like  colors  o'er  the  morning  skies, 

As  bright,  as  transient  too. 

The  bashful  look,  the  rising  breast, 

Alternate  spread  alarms : 
The  lovely  stranger  stands  confess'd, 

A  mai4  in  all  her  charms. 

And,  "  Ah  !  forgive  a  stranger  rude — 
A  wretch  forlorn,"  she  cried  ; 

"  "Whose  feet  unhallow'd  thus  intrude 
"Where  heaven  and  you  reside. 

"  But  let  a  maid  thy  pity  share, 
"Whom  love  has  taught  to  stray ; 

"Who  seeks  for  rest,  but  finds  despair 
Companion  of  her  way. 

"  My  father  lived  beside  the  Tyne, 

A  wealthy  lord  was  he  : 
And  all  his  wealth  was  mark'd  as  mine, 

He  had  but  only  me. 


THE  HERMIT.  1?S 

"  To  win  me  from  his  tender  arms, 

Unnumber'd  suitors  came, 
Who  praised  me  for  imputed  charms, 

And  felt,  or  feign'd,  a  flame. 

"  Each  hour  a  mercenary  crowd 

"With  richest  proffers  strove  ; 
Amongst  the  rest  young  Edwin  bow'd, 

But  never  talk'd  of  love. 

"  In  humble,  simplest  habit  clad, 

No  wealth  nor  power  had  he ; 
Wisdom  and  worth  were  all  he  had, 

But  these  were  all  to  me. 

"  And  when,  beside  me  in  the  dale. 

He  caroll'd  lays  of  love. 
His  breath  lent  fragrance  to  the  gale, 

And  music  to  the  grove.* 

"  The  blossom  opening  to  the  day, 

The  dews  of  heaven  refined, 
Could  nought  of  purity  display 

To  emulate  his  mind. 

.  "  The  dew,  the  blossom  on  the  tree. 

With  charms  inconstant  shine  ; 
Their  charms  were  his,  but,  woe  to  me 
Their  constancy  was  mine. 

"  For  still  I  tried  each  fickle  art, 

Importunate  and  vain  ; 
And  while  his  passion  touch'd  my  heart, 

I  triumph'd  in  his  pain  ; 

*This  stanza  was  preserved  by  Richard  Archdale,  Esq..  a 
member  of  the  Irish  Parliament,  to  whom  it  was  given  by  Gold- 
smith, and  was  first  inserted  after  tlie  author's  death. 


174  THE  UEEMIT. 

"  Till,  quite  dejected  with  my  scorn, 

He  left  me  to  my  pride ; 
And  sought  a  solitude  forlorn, 

In  secret,  where  he  died. 

"  But  mine  the  sorrow,  mine  the  fault, 
And  well  my  life  shall  pay  ; 

I'll  seek  the  solitude  he  sought, 
And  stretch  me  where  he  lay. 

"  And  there  forlorn,  despairing,  hid, 

I'll  lay  me  down  and  die ; 
'Twas  so  for  me  that  Edwin  did. 

And  so  for  him  will  I," 

"  Forbid  it.  Heaven !  "  the  Hermit  cried, 
And  clasp'd  her  to  his  breast ; 

The  wondering  fair  one  turn'd  to  chide— 
'Twas  Edwin's  self  that  press'd  ! 

"  Turn,  Angelina,  ever  dear, 

My  charmer,  turn  to  see 
Thy  own,  thy  long-lost  Edwin  here, 

Kestored  to  love  and  thee. 

"  Thus  let  me  hold  thee  to  my  heart. 

And  every  care  resign  : 
And  shall  we  never,  never  part, 

My  life — my  all  that's  mine. 

"  No,  never  from  this  hour  to  part 

We'll  live  and  love  so  true. 
The  sigh  that  rends  thy  constant  heart 

Shall  break  thy  Edwin's  too." 


THE  HA  UNCH  OF  VENISON.  175 


THE  HAUNCH  OF  VENISON  * 

A  POETICAL  EPISTLE  TO  LORD  CLARE. 

Thanks,  my  lord,  for  your  venison,  for  finer  or  fatter 
Ne'er  ranged  in  a  forest,  or  smoked  in  a  platter. 
The  haunch  was  a  picture  for  painters  to  study, 
The  fat  was  so  white,  and  the  lean  was  so  ruddy ; 
Though  my  stomach  was  sharp,  I  could  scarce  help 

regretting 
To  spoil  such  a  delicate  picture  by  eating : 
I  had  thoughts,  in  my  chamber  to  place  it  in  view 
To  be  shown  to  my  friends  as  a  piece  of  virtu ; 
As  in  some  Irish  houses,  where  things  are  so  so. 
One  gammon  of  bacon  hangs  up  for  a  show ; 
But  for  eating  a  rasher  of  what  they  take  pride  in, 
They'd  as  soon  think  of  eating  the  pan  it  is  fried  in. 
But  hold — let  me  pause — don't  I  hear  you  pronounce, 
This  tale  of  the  bacon's  a  damnable  bounce  ? 
"Well,  suppose  it  a  bounce — sure  a  poet  may  try, 
By  a  bounce  now  and  then,  to  get  courage  to  fly. 

But,  my  lord,  it's  no  bounce  :  I  protest,  in  my  turn, 
It's  a  truth,  and  your  lordship  may  ask  Mr.  Burn.f 
To  go  on  with  my  tale  :  as  I  gazed  on  the  haunch, 
I  thought  of  a  friend  that  was  trusty  and  staunch, 

*The  description  of  the  dinner  party  in  this  poem  is  imitated 
from  Boileau's  fourth  Satire.  Boileau  liimself  took  the  hint  from 
Horace,  Lil.  ii.  Sat.  8,  which  has  also  been  imitated  by  Rognier, 
Sat.  10. 

f  Lord  Clare's  nephew. 


176  THE  HAUNCH  OF  VENISON. 

So  I  cut  it,  and  sent  it  to  Keynolds  undrest, 

To  paint  it,  or  eat  it,  just  as  he  liked  best. 

Of  the  neck  and  the  breast  I  had  next  to  dispose — 

'T  was  a  neck  and  a  breast  that  might  rival  Munro's ; 

But  in  parting  with  these  I  was  puzzled  again. 

With  the  how,  and  the  who,  and  the  where,  and  the 

when. 
There's  H — d,  and  C — y,  and  H — rth,  and  H — flf, 
I  think  they  love  venison — I  know  they  love  beef ; 
There's  my  countryman,  Higgins — oh  !  let  him  alone 
For  making  a  blunder,  or  picking  a  bone : 
But,  hang  it !  to  poets  who  seldom  can  eat, 
Your  very  good  mutton's  a  very  good  treat ; 
Such  dainties  to  them  their  health  it  might  hurt ; 
It's  like  sending  them  ruffles,  when  wanting  a  shirt. 

While  thus  I  debated,  in  reverie  centred, 
An  acquaintance — a  friend,  as  he  call'd  himself — en- 

ter'd ; 
An  under-bred,  fine-spoken  fellow  was  he. 
And  he  smiled  as  he  looked  at  the  venison  and  me, — 
"  What  have  you  got  here  ? — Why,  this  is  good  eating ; 
Your  own,  I  suppose — or  is  it  in  waiting  ?  " 
"  Why,  whose  should  it  be  ? "  cried  I,  with  a  flounce, 
"  I  get  these  things  often" — but  that  was  a  bounce: 
"  Some  lords,  my  acquaintance,  that  settle  the  nation, 
Are  pleased  to  be  kind — but  I  hate  ostentation." 
"  If  that  be  the  case,  then,"  cried  he,  very  gay, 
"  I'm  glad  I  have  taken  this  house  in  my  way  : 
To-morrow  you  take  a  poor  dinner  with  me  ; 
No  words — I  insist  on't — precisely  at  three  ; 
We'll  have  Johnson,  and  Burke, — all  the  wits  will  be 

there : 
My  acquaintance  is  slight,  or  I'd  ask  my  Lord  Clare. 


TEE  HAUNCH  OF  VENISON.  177 

And,  now  that  I  think  on't,  as  I  am  a  sinner, 
We  wanted  this  venison  to  make  out  a  dinner. 
What  say  you — a  pasty  ?  it  shall,  and  it  must, 
And  my  wife,  little  Kitty,  is  famous  for  crust. 
Here,  porter — this  venison  with  me  to  Mile-end: 
No  stirring,  I  beg — my  dear  friend, — my  dear  friend." 
Thus,  snatching  his  hat,  he  brush'd  off  like  the  wind, 
And  the  porter  and  eatables  follow'd  behind. 

Left  alone  to  reflect,  having  emptied  my  shelf, 
And  "  nobody  with  me  at  sea  but  myself  ;  "  * 
Though  I  could  not  help  thinking  my  gentleman  hasty, 
Yet  Johnson,  and  Burke,  and  a  good  venison  pasty. 
Were  things  that  I  never  disliked  in  my  life, 
Though  clogg'd  with  a  coxcomb,  and  Kitty  his  wife. 
So  next  day,  in  due  splendor  to  make  my  approach, 
I  drove  to  his  door  in  ray  own  hackney-coach. 

When  come  to  the  place  where  we  all  were  to  dine, 
(A  chair-lumbered  closet,  just  twelve  feet  by  nine). 
My  friend  bade  me  welcome,  but  struck  me  quite  dumb 
With  tidings  that  Johnson  and  Burke  would  not  come ; 
"  For  I  knew  it,"  he  cried,  "  both  eternally  fail. 
The  one  with  his  speeches,  and  t'other  with  Thrale  :  f 
But  no  matter,  I'll  warrant  we'll  make  up  the  party 
With  two  full  as  clever,  and  ten  times  as  hearty. 
The  one  is  a  Scotchman,  the  other  a  Jew : 
They're  both  of  them  merry,  and  authors  like  you : 
The  one  writes  the  Snarler,  the  other  the  Scourge ; 
Some,  thinks  he  writes  Cinna — he  owns  to  Panurge." 


*  See  the  letters  that  passed  between  his  Royal  Highness  Henry 
Duke  of  Cumberland,  and  Lady  Grosvenor.     12mo.  1769. 

t  An  eminent  London  brewer,  M.  P.,  for  the  borough  of  South- 
wark,  at  whose  table  Dr.  Johnson  was  a  frequent  guest. 


178  THE  HAUNCH  OF  VENISON. 

While  thus  he  described  them,  by  trade  and  by  name, 
They  enter'd,  and  dinner  was  served  as  they  came. 

At  the  top,  a  fried  liver  and  bacon  were  seen ; 
At  the  bottom,  was  tripe  in  a  swinging  tureen ; 
At  the  sides,  there  was  spinage,  and  pudding  made  hot ; 
In  the  middle,  a  place  where  the  pasty — was  not. 
Now,  my  lord,  as  for  tripe,  it's  my  utter  aversion, 
And  your  bacon  I  hate  like  a  Turk  or  a  Persian ; 
So  there  I  sat  stuck  like  a  horse  in  a  pound, 
"While  the  bacon  and  liver  went  merrily  round  : 

But  what  vex'd  me  most  was  that  d 'd  Scottish 

rogue. 
With  his  long-winded    speeches,   his  smiles,  and  his 

brogue ; 
And,  "  Madame,"  quoth  he,  "may  this  bit  be  my  poison, 
A  prettier  dinner  I  never  set  eyes  on  : 
Pray,  a  slice  of  your  liver,  though  may  1  be  curst, 
But  I've  ate  of  your  tripe  till  I'm  ready  to  burst." 
"The  tripe!"  quoth    the  Jew,  with   his   chocolate 

cheek, 
I  could  dine  on  this  tripe  seven  days  in  a  week : 
I  like  these  here  dinners,  so  pretty  and  small ; 
But  your  friend  there,  the  Doctor,  eats  nothing  at  all. 
"  O  ho  ! "  quoth  my  friend,  "  he'll  come  on  in  a  trice. 
He's  keeping  a  corner  for  something  that's  nice  : 
There's  a  pasty." — "  A  pasty  !  "  repeated  the  Jew, 
'  I  don't  care  if  I  keep  a  corner  for't  too." 
'  What,  the  deil,  mon,  a  pasty  ! "  re-echoed  the  Scot, 
'  Though  splitting,  I'll  still  keep  a  corner  for  that.' 
'  We'll  all  keep  a  corner,"  the  lady  cried  out ; 
'  We'll  all  keep  a  corner,"  was  echo'd  about. 
While  thus  we  resolved,  and  the  party  delay 'd, 
With  looks  that  quite  petrified,  enter'd  the  maid : 


35 


THE  HAUNCH  OF  VENISON.  179 

A  visage  so  sad,  and  so  pale  with  affright, 
"Waked  Priam,  in  drawing  his  curtains  by  night. 
But  we  quickly  found   out — for   who   could  mistake 

her? — 
That  she  came  with  some  terrible  news  from  the  baker 
And  so  it  fell  out :  for  that  negligent  sloven 
Had  shut  out  the  pasty  on  shutting  his  oven. 
Sad  Philomel  thus — but  let  similes  drop — 
And  now  that  I  think  on't,  the  story  may  stop. 

To  be  plain,  my  good  lord,  it's  but  labor  misplaced. 
To  send  such  good  verses  to  one  of  your  taste  ; 
You've  got  an  odd  something — a  kind  of  discerning, 
A  relish — a  taste — sicken'd  over  by  learning  ; 
At  least  it's  your  temper,  as  very  well  known, 
That  you  think  very  slightly  of  all  that's  your  own, 
So  perhaps,  in  your  habits  of  thinking  amiss, 
You  may  make  a  mistake,  and  think  slightly  of  this. 


180  RETALIATION, 


RETALIATIOK 

Dr.  Goldsmith  and  some  of  his  friends  occasionally  dined  at  the 
St.  James's  Coffee-house.  One  day,  it  was  proposed  to  write 
epitaphs  on  him.  His  country,  dialect,  and  person,  furnished 
subjects  of  witticism.  He  was  called  on  for  Retaliation,  and, 
at  their  next  meeting,  produced  the  following  poem. 

Of  old,  when  Scarron  his  companion  invited, 
Each  guest  brought  his  dish,  and  the  feast  was  united  ; 
If  our  landlord  *  supplies  us  with  beef  and  with  fish, 
Let  each  guest  bring  himself,  and  he  brings  the  best 

dish : 
Oar  Deanf  shall  be  venison,  just  fresh  from  the  plains ; 
Our  Burke:}:  shall  be  tongae,  with  a  garnish  of  brains; 
Our  Will  §  shall  be  wild-fowl  of  excellent  flavor, 
And  Dick  I  with  his  pepper  shall  heighten  the  savor ; 
Our  Cumberland's  1^  sweetbread  its  place  shall  obtain, 
And  Douglas  **  is  pudding,  substantial  and  plain  ; 

*  The  master  of  the  St.  James's  Coffee-house,  where  the  Doctor 
and  the  friends  he  has  characterized  in  this  poem,  occasionally 
dined. 

t  Doctor  Barnard,  Dean  of  Derry,  in  Ireland,  afterw^ards  Bishop 
of  Kiilaloe. 

t  The  Right  Hon.  Edmund  Burke. 

§  Mr.  "Williain  Burke,  formerly  secretary  to  General  Conway 
and  member  for  Bedwin. 

I  Mr.  Richard  Burke,  collector  of  Granada. 

T[  Mr.  Richard  Cumberland,  author  of  TJie  West  Indian,  The 
Jew,  and  other  dramatic  works. 

**  Doctor  Douglas,  Canon  of  Windsor,  and  afterwards  Bishop 
of  Salisbury,  was  himself  a  native  of  Scotland,  and  obtained 
considprable  reputation  by  his  detection  of  the  forgeries  of  his 
countrymen,  Lauder  and  Bower. 


RETALIATION.  181 

Our  Garrick's  *  a  salad,  for  in  him  we  see 
Oil,  vinegar,  sugar,  and  saltness  agree : 
To  make  out  the  dinner,  full  certain  I  am, 
That  Ridge  f  is  anchovy,  and  Reynolds  X  is  lamb ; 
That  Hickey's  §  a  capon,  and,  by  the  same  rule, 
Magnanimous  Goldsmith  a  gooseberry  fool. 
At  a  dinner  so  various — at  such  a  repast, 
Who'd  not  be  a  glutton,  and  stick  to  the  last? 
Here,  waiter,  more  wine,  let  me  sit  while  I'm  able. 
Till  all  my  companions  sink  under  the  table ; 
Then,  with  chaos  and  blunders  encircling  my  head, 
Let  me  ponder,  and  tell  what  I  think  of  the  dead. 

Here  lies  the  good  Dean,  reunited  to  earth, 
Who  mixed  reason  with  pleasure,  and  wisdom  with 

mirth  : 
If  he  had  any  faults,  he  has  left  us  in  doubt — 
At  least,  in  six  weeks  I  could  not  find  'em  out ; 
Yet  some  have  declared,  and  it  can't  be  denied  'em, 
That  sly-boots  was  cursedly  cunning  to  hide  'em. 

Here  lies  our  good  Edmund,  whose  genius  was  such, 
We  scarcel}''  can  praise  it  or  blame  it  too  much  ; 
Who,  born  for  the  universe,  narrow'd  his  mind, 
And  to  party  gave  up  what  was  meant  for  mankind ; 
Though  fraught  with  all  learning,  yet  straining  his 

throat, 
To  persuade  Tommy  Townshend  I  to  lend  him  a  vote ; 

*  David  Garrick,  Esq. 

t  Counsellor  John  Ridge,  a  gentleman  belonging  td  the  Irish 
bar. 

X  Sir  Jojhua  Reynolds. 

§An  eminent  attorney. 

(  Mr.  T.  Townsheud,  member  for  Whitchurch,  afterwards  Lord 
Sydney. 


182  BETALIATION. 

Who,  too  deep  for  his  hearers,  still  went  on  refining, 
And  thought   of  convincing,    while  they  thought  of 

dining :  * 
Though  equal  to  all  things,  for  all  things  unfit ; 
Too  nice  for  a  statesman,  too  proud  for  a  wit ; 
For  a  patriot,  too  cool ;  for  a  drudge  disobedient ; 
And  too  fond  of  the  right  to  pursue  the  expedient. 
In  short,  'twas  his  fate,  unemploy'd  or  in  place,  sir, 
To  eat  mutton  cold,  and  cut  blocks  with  a  razor. 

Here  lies  honest  William,  whose  heart  was  a  mint. 
While  the  owner  ne'er  knew  half  the  good  that  was 

in't: 
The  pupil  of  impulse,  it  forced  him  along. 
His  conduct  still  right,  with  his  argument  wrong ; 
Still  aiming  at  honor,  yet  fearing  to  roam, 
The  coachman  was  tipsy,  the  chariot  drove  home. 
Would  you  ask  for  his  merits  ?  alas  !  he  had  none  ; 
What  was  good  was  spontaneous,  his  faults  were  his 
own. 

Here  lies  honest  Richard,  whose  fate  I  must  sigh  at ; 
Alas,  that  such  frolic  should  now  be  so  quiet ! 
What  spirits  were  his  !  what  wit  and  what  whim ! 
Now  breaking  a  jest,  and  now  breaking  a  limb  !  f 

*  Mr.  Burke's  speeches  in  Parliament,  though  distinguished  by- 
all  the  force  of  reasoning  and  eloquence  of  their  highly-gifted 
author,  were  not  always  listened  to  with  patience  by  his  brother 
members,  who  not  unfrequently  took  the  opportunity  of  retiring 
to  dinner  when  he  rose  to  speak.  To  this  circumstance,  which 
procured  for  the  orator  the  sobriquet  of  the  Dinner  Bell,  allusion 
is  here  made. 

f  Mr.  Richard  Burke  having  slightly  fractured  an  arm  and  a 
leg  at  different  times,  the  Doctor  has  rallied  him  on  these  acci- 
dents, as  a  kind  of  retributive  justice,  for  breaking  jests  upon 
other  people. 


BETALIATION.  183 

Kow  -wrangling  and  grumbling  to  keep  up  the  ball, 

Now  teasing  and  vexing,  yet  laughing  at  all ! 

In  short,  so  provoking  a  devil  was  Dick, 

That   we  wished  him  full  ten   times   a-day  at  Old 

Xick. 
But  missing  his  mirth  and  agreeable  vein, 
As  often  we  wish'd  to  have  Dick  back  again. 

Here  Cumberland  lies,  having  acted  his  parts, 
The  Terence  of  England,  the  mender  of  hearts  ; 
A  flattering  painter,  who  made  it  his  care 
To  draw  men  as  they  ought  to  be,  not  as  they  are. 
His  gallants  are  all  faultless,  his  women  divine, 
And  Comedy  wonders  at  being  so  fine  ; 
Like  a  tragedy  queen  he  has  dizeu'd  her  out, 
Or  rather  like  Tragedy  giving  a  rout. 
His  fools  have  their  follies  so  lost  in  a  crowd. 
Of  virtues  and  feelings,  that  Folly  grows  proud ; 
And  coxcombs,  alike  in  their  failings  alone. 
Adopting  his  portraits,  are  pleased  with  their  owq 
Say,  where  has  our  poet  this  malady  caught  ? 
Or  wherefore  his  characters  thus  without  fault  ? 
Say,  was  it,  that  vainly  directing  his  view 
To  find  out  men's  virtues,  and  finding  them  few. 
Quite  sick  of  pursuing  each  troublesome  elf, 
He  grew  lazy  at  last,  and  drew  from  himself  ? 

Here  Douglas  retires  from  his  toils  to  relax, 
The  scourge  of  impostors,  the  terror  of  quacks : 
Come,  all  ye  quack  bards,  and  ye  quacking  divine^*-, 
Come,  and  dance  on  the  spot  where  your  tyrant  re- 
clines. 
When  satire  and  censure  encircled  his  throne, 
I  fear'd  for  your  safety,  I  fear'd  for  my  own  ; 
But  now  he  is  gone,  and  we  want  a  detector, 


184  RETALIATION. 

Our  Dodds  ^'  shall  be  pious,  our  Kenricks  f  shall  lec- 
ture; 
Macpherson  ^  write  bombast,  and  call  it  a  style  ; 
Our  Townshend  make  speeches,  and  I  shall  compile  : 
New   Landers  §  and  Bowers  ||  the  Tweed  shall  cross 

over, 
No  countryman  living  their  tricks  to  discover ; 
Detection  her  taper  shall  quench  to  a  spark. 
And  Scotchman  meet  Scotchman,  and  cheat  in  the 
dark. 
Here  lies  David  Garrick,  describe  him,  who  can 
An  abridgment  of  all  that  was  pleasant  in  man  ; 
As  an  actor,  confess'd  without  rival  to  shine. 
As  a  wit,  if  not  first,  in  the  very  first  line  : 
Yet,  with  talents  like  these,  and  an  excellent  heart, 
The  man  had  his  failings,  a  dupe  to  his  art. 
Like  an  ill-judging  beauty,  his  colors  he  spread, 
And  beplaster'd  with  rouge  his  own  natural  red. 

*  The  Rev.  Dr,  Dodd,  who  was  executed  for  forgery. 

\  Dr.  Kenrick,  who  read  lectures  at  the  Devil  Tavern,  under 
the  title  of  "  The  School  of  Shakspeare."  He  was  a  well-known 
writer,  of  prodigious  versatility,  and  some  talent.  Dr.  Johnson 
observed  of  him,  "  He  is  one  of  the  many  who  have  made  them- 
selves pwbZic,  without  making  themselves  known." 

|:  James  Macpherson,  Esq.,  who  from  the  mere  force  of  his 
style,  wrote  down  the  first  poet  of  all  antiquity. 

§  William  Lauder,  who,  by  interpolating  certain  passages  from 
the  Adamus  Exul  of  Grotius,  with  translations  from  Paradise 
Lost,  endeavored  to  fix  on  Milton  a  charge  of  plagiarism  from  the 
modern  Latin  poets.  Dr.  Douglas  detected  and  exposed  this  im- 
posture, and  extorted  from  the  author  a  confession  and  apology. 

II  Archibald  Bower,  a  Scottish  Jesuit,  and  author  of  a  History 
of  the  Popes  from  St.  Peter  to  Lambertini.  Dr.  Douglas  con- 
victed Bower  of  gross  imposture,  and  totally  destroyed  the  credit 
of  his  history. 


RETALIATION.  185 

Ott  the  stage  he  was  natural,  simple,  affecting ; 
'T^yas  only  that  when  he  was  off  he  was  acting. 
With  no  reason  on  earth  to  go  out  of  his  way, 
He  turn'cl  and  he  varied  full  ten  times  a  day  : 
Though  secure  of  our  hearts  yet  confoundedly  sick, 
If  they  were  not  his  own  by  finessing  and  trick : 
He  cast  off  his  friends,  as  a  huntsman  his  pack, 
For  he  knew  when  he  pleased  he  could  whistle  them 

back. 
Of  praise  a  mere  glutton,  he  swallow'd  what  came, 
And  the  puff  of  a  dunce  he  mistook  it  for  fame  ; 
Till  his  relish,  grown  callous  almost  to  disease, 
Who  pepper'd  the  highest  was  surest  to  please. 
But  let  us  be  candid,  and  speak  out  our  mind. 
If  dunces  applauded,  he  paid  them  in  kind. 
Ye  Kenricks,  ye  Kellys,*  and  Woodfalls  f  so  grave. 
What  a  commerce  was  yours,  while  you  got  and  you 

gave! 
How  did  Grub-street  re-echo  the  shouts  that  you 

raised. 
While  he  was  be-Roscius'd,  and  you  were  be-praised  I 
But  peace  to  his  spirit,  wherever  it  flies, 
To  act  as  an  angel  and  mix  with  the  skies : 
Those  poets  who  owe  their  best  fame  to  his  skill, 
Shall  still  be  his  flatterers,  go  where  he  will ; 
Old   Shakspeare   receive  him    with  praise   and   with 

love, 
And  Beaumonts  and  Bens  be  his  Kellys  above. 

Here  Hickey  reclines,  a  most  blunt,  pleasant  creature, 
And  slander  itself  must  allow  him  good  nature ; 

*  Mr.  Hugh  Kelly,  originally  a  stayniaker,  afterwards  a  news* 
pa]K>r  oditor  and  dramatist,  and  latterly  a  barrister, 
t  Mr.  William  Woodfall,  printer  of  the  Morning  Chronicle. 


186  RETALIATION. 

He  cherish'd  his  friend,  and  he  relish'd  a  bumper ; 

Yet  one  fault  he  had,  and  that  one  was  a  thumper. 

Perhaps  you  may  ask  if  the  man  was  a  miser  ? 

I  answer,  No,  no,  for  he  always  was  wiser. 

Too  courteous,  perhaps,  or  obligingly  flat  ? 

His  very  worst  foe  can't  accuse  him  of  that. 

Perhaps  he  confided  in  men  as  they  go, 

And  so  was  too  foolishly  honest  ?  Ah,  no  ! 

Then  what  was  his  failing  ?  come  tell  it,  and  burn  ye : 

He  was,  could  he  help  it  ?  a  special  attorney. 

Here  Keynolds  is  laid,  and,  to  tell  you  my  mind, 
He  has  not  left  a  wiser  or  better  behind  ; 
His  pencil  was  striking,  resistless,  and  grand. 
His  manners  were  gentle,  complying,  and  bland  : 
Still  born  to  improve  us  in  every  part. 
His  pencil  our  faces,  his  manners  our  heart. 
To  coxcombs  averse,  yet  most  civilly  steering, 
When  they  judged  without  skill,  he  was  still  hard  of 

hearing : 
When  they  talked  of  their  Raphaels,  Correggios,  and 

stuff, 
He  shifted  his  trumpet,*  and  only  took  snuff. 

*  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  was  so  deaf  as  to  be  under  the  necessity 
of  using  an  ear-trumpet  in  company. 


POSTSCEIPT,  187 


POSTSCRIPT. 

After  the  fourth  edition  of  this  poem  was  printed,  the  publisher 
received  the  following  epitaph  on  Mr.  Whitefoord,*  from  a 
friend  of  the  late  Dr.  Goldsmith. 

Here  Whitefoord  reclines,  and,  deny  it  who  can, 
Though  he  merrily  lived,  he  is  now  a  grave  man :  f 
Rare  compound  of  oddity,  frolic,  and  fun ! 
Who  relish'd  a  joke,  and  rejoiced  in  a  pun  ; 
Whose  temper  was  generous,  open,  sincere, 
A  stranger  to  flattery  a  stranger  to  fear  ; 
Who  scatter'd  around  wit  and  humor  at  will-; 
Whose  daily  hon  mots  half  a  column  might  fill : 
A  Scotchman,  from  pride  and  from  prejudice  free  ; 
A  scholar,  yet  surely  no  pedant  was  he. 

What  pity,  alas  !  that  so  liberal  a  mind 
Should  so  long  be  to  newspaper  essays  confined ! 
Who  perhaps  to  the  summit  of  science  could  soar, 
Yet  content  if  "  the  table  he  set  in  a  roar : " 
Whose  talents  to  fill  any  station  were  fit, 
Yet  happy  if  Woodfall  J  confess'd  him  a  wit. 

Ye  newspaper  witlings,  ye  pert  scribbling  folks  I 
Who  copied  his  squibs,  and  re-echoed  his  jokes  ; 
Ye  tame  imitators,  ye  servile  herd,  come, 
Still  follow  your  master,  and  visit  his  tomb  ; 

*  Mr.  Caleb  Whitefoord,  author  of  many  humorous  essays. 

t  Mr.  Wliitefoord  was  so  notorious  a  punster,  that  Dr.  Gold- 
smith used  to  say  it  was  impossible  to  keep  him  company,  with- 
out beinp;  infected  with  the  itch  of  punning. 

X  Mr.  H.  S.  Woodfall,  printer  of  the  Public  Advertiser. 


188  THE  DOUBLE  TRANSFORMATION. 

To  deck  it,  bring  with  you  festoons  of  the  vine, 
And  copious  libations  bestow  on  his  shrine ; 
Then  strew  all  around  it  (you  can  do  no  less) 
Cross  Headings,  Ship  JVews,  and  Mistakes  of  the  Press.* 

Merry  Whitefoord,  farewell !  for  thy  sake  I  admit 
That  a  Scot  may  have  humor,  I  had  almost  said  wit ; 
This  debt  to  thy  memory  I  cannot  refuse. 

Thou   best-humor'd  man  with    the  worst-humor'd 
Muse. 


THE 

DOUBLE  TKANSFOKMATION. 

A  TALE. 

Secluded  from  domestic  strife, 

Jack  Book-worm  led  a  college  life ; 

A  fellowship  at  twenty-five 

Made  him  the  happiest  man  alive ; 

He  drank  his  glass,  and  cracked  his  joke, 

And  freshmen  wonder'd  as  he  spoke. 

Such  pleasures,  unalloy'd  with  care, 
Could  any  accident  impair  ? 
Could  Cupid's  shaft  at  length  transfix 
Our  swain,  arrived  at  thirty -six  ? 

Oh,  had  the  archer  ne'er  come  down 
To  ravage  in  a  country  town ! 
Or  Flavia  been  content  to  stop 
At  triumphs  in  a  Fleet  Street  shop ! 
Oh,  had  her  eyes  forgot  to  blaze ! 
Or  Jack  had  wanted  eyes  to  gaze ! 

*  Mr.   Whitefoord   had    frequently  indulged  the  town   with 
humorous  pieces  under  those  titles  in  the  Pvblic  Advertiser. 


THE  DOUBLE  TRANSFORMATION.  189 

Oh  ! — but  let  exclamation  cease, 

Her  presence  banished  all  his  peace ; 

So  with  decorum  all  things  carried, 

Miss  frown'd,  and  blush'd,  and  then  was — married. 

Need  we  expose  to  vulgar  sight 
The  raptures  of  the  bridal  night  ? 
Need  we  intrude  on  hallo w'd  ground, 
Or  draw  the  curtains  closed  around  ? 
Let  it  suffice  that  each  had  charms  : 
He  clasped  a  goddess  in  his  arms ;        , 
And  though  she  felt  his  usage  rough, 
Yet  in  a  man  'twas  well  enough. 

The  honey-moon  like  lightning  flew, 
The  second  brought  its  transports  too ; 
A  third,  a  fourth,  were  not  amiss, 
The  fifth  was  friendship  mixed  with  bliss  : 
But,  when  a  twelvemonth  passed  awa}^, 
Jack  found  his  goddess  made  of  clay  ; 
Found  half  the  charms  that  deck'd  her  face 
Arose  from  powder,  shreds,  or  lace ; 
But  still  the  worst  remain'd  behind, — 
That  very  face  had  robb'd  her  mind. 
Skill'd  in  no  other  arts  was  she, 
But  dressing,  patching,  repartee  ; 
And,  just  as  humor  rose  or  fell, 
By  turns  a  slattern  or  a  belle. 
'Tis  true  she  dressed  with  modern  grace, 
Half  naked,  at  a  ball  or  race  ; 
But  when  at  home,  at  board  or  bed, 
Five  greasy  nightcaps  wrapp'd  her  head. 
Could  so  much  beauty  condescend 
To  be  a  dull,  domestic  friend  ? 
Could  any  curtain-lectures  bring 


190  THE  DOUBLE  TRANSFORMATION, 

To  decency  so  fine  a  thing ! 

In  short,  by  night,  'twas  fits  or  fretting ; 

By  day,  'twas  gadding  or  coquetting. 

Fond  to  be  seen,  she  kept  a  bevy 

Of  powdered  coxcombs  at  her  levee  ; 

The  squire  and  captain  took  their  stations, 

And  twenty  other  near  relations  : 

Jack  suck'd  his  pipe,  and  often  broke 

A  sigh  in  suffocating  smoke ; 

While  all  their  hours  were  pass'd  between 

Insulting  repartee  and  spleen. 

Thus  as  her  faults  each  day  were  known. 
He  thinks  her  features  coarser  grown ; 
He  fancies  every  vice  she  shows. 
Or  thins  her  lips,  or  points  her  nose : 
Whenever  rage  or  envy  rise, 
How  wide  her  mouth,  how  wild  her  eyesl 
He  knows  not  how,  but  so  it  is. 
Her  face  is  grown  a  knowing  phiz  ; 
And,  though  her  fops  are  wondrous  civil, 
He  thinks  her  ugly  as  the  devil. 

Now,  to  perplex  the  ravell'd  noose 
As  each  a  different  way  pursues, 
While  sullen  or  loquacious  strife 
Promised  to  hold  them  on  for  life, 
That  dire  disease,  whose  ruthless  power 
Withers  the  beautv's  transient  flower, — 
Lo  !  the  small-pox,  with  horrid  glare, 
Levell'd  its  terrors  at  the  fair ; 
And,  rifling  every  youthful  grace, 
Left  but  the  remnant  of  a  face. 

The  glass,  grown  hateful  to  her  sight, 
Reflected  now  a  perfect  fright : 


THE  GIFT.  191 

Each  former  art  she  vainly  tries 
To  bring  back  lustre  to  her  eyes  ; 
In  vain  she  tries  her  paste  and  creams 
To  smooth  her  skin,  or  hide  its  seams  ; 
Her  country  beaux  and  city  cousins, 
Lovers  no  more,  flew  off  by  dozens ; 
The  squire  himself  was  seen  to  yield, 
And  e'en  the  captain  quit  the  field. 

Poor  madam,  now  condemn'd  to  hack 
The  rest  of  life  with  anxious  Jack, 
Perceiving  others  fairly  flown. 
Attempted  pleasing  him  alone. 
Jack  soon  was  dazzled  to  behold 
Her  present  face  surpass  the  old  : 
"With  modesty  her  cheeks  are  dyed, 
Humility  displaces  pride ; 
For  tawdry  finery  is  seen 
A  person  ever  neatly  clean  ; 
No  more  presuming  on  her  sway, 
She  learns  good  nature  every  day  : 
Serenely  gay,  and  strict  in  duty, 
Jack  finds  his  wife  a  perfect  beauty. 


THE   GIFT.* 

TO  IRIS,  IX  BOW  STREET,  COVENT  GARDEN. 

Say,  cruel  Iris,  pretty  rake. 

Dear  mercenary  beauty, 
What  annual  offering  shall  I  make 

Expressive  of  my  duty  ? 

♦  Imitated  from  Grecourt,  a  witty  French  poet. 


192  AN  ELEGY. 

My  heart,  a  victim  to  thine  eyes, 

Should  I  at  once  deliver, 
Say,  would  the  angry  fair  one  prize 

The  gift,  who  slights  the  giver  ? 

A  bill,  a  jewel,  watch,  or  toy. 
My  rivals  give — and  let  'em : 

If  gems,  or  gold,  impart  a  joy, 
I'll  give  them — when  I  get  'em. 

I'll  give — but  not  the  full-blown  rose, 
Or  rosebud  more  in  fashion  ; 

Such  short-lived  offerings  but  disclose 
A  transitory  passion — 

I'll  give  thee  something  yet  unpaid, 
Not  less  sincere  than  civil, — 

I'll  give  thee — ah  !  too  charming  maid  !- 
I'll  give  thee — to  the  Devil ! 


AN  ELEGY  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A  MAD  DOG 

Good  people  all,  of  every  sort, 

Give  ear  unto  my  song, 
And  if  you  find  it  wondrous  short, 

It  cannot  hold  you  long. 

In  Islington  there  was  a  man. 
Of  whom  the  world  might  say, 

That  still  a  godly  race  he  ran, 
Whene'er  he  went  to  pray. 


AN  ELEGY.  198 

A  kind  and  gentle  heart  he  had, 

To  comfort  friends  and  foes ; 
The  naked  every  day  he  clad, 

When  he  put  on  his  clothes. 

And  in  that  town  a  dog  was  found. 

As  many  dogs  there  be, 
Both  mongrel,  puppy,  whelp,  and  hound, 

And  curs  of  low  degree. 

This  dog  and  man  at  first  were  friends ; 

But  when  a  pique  began, 
The  dog,  to  gain  his  private  ends, 

Went  mad,  and  bit  the  man. 

Around  from  all  the  neighboring  streets 

The  wond'ring  neighbors  ran. 
And  swore  the  dog  had  lost  his  wits, 

To  bite  so  good  a  man. 

The  wound  it  seem'd  both  sore  and  sad 

To  every  Christian  eye  ; 
And  while  they  swore  the  dog  was  mad, . 

They  swore  the  man  would  die. 

But  soon  a  wonder  came  to  light. 
That  show'd  the  rogues  they  lied :  ' 

The  man  recover'd  of  the  bite — 
The  dog  it  was  that  died. 


1»4  .    THE  LOGICIANS  REFUTED. 


THE  LOGICIANS  EEFUTED  * 

IN  IMITATION   OF  DEAN  SWIFT. 

Logicians  have  but  ill  defined 

As  rational  the  human  mind  : 

Reason,  they  say,  belongs  to  man, 

But  let  them  prove  it  if  they  can. 

"Wise  Aristotle  and  Smiglesius, 

By  ratiocinations  specious, 

Have  strove  to  prove  with  great  precision, 

"With  definition  and  division. 

Homo  est  ratione  preditum  / 

But  for  my  soul  I  cannot  credit  'em  ; 

And  must  in  spite  of  them  maintain, 

That  man  and  all  his  ways  are  vain ; 

And  that  this  boasted  lord  of  nature 

Is  both  a  weak  and  erring  creature  ; 

That  instinct  is  a  surer  guide 

Than  reason,  boasting  mortals'  pride ; 

And  that  brute  beasts  are  far  before  'em— > 

Deus  est  anima  hrutorum. 

"Whoever  knew  an  honest  brute 

At  law  his  neighbor  prosecute. 

Bring  action  for  assault  and  battery  ? 

Or  friend  beguile  with  lies  and  flattery  ? 

*  This  happy  imitation  was  adopted  by  his  Dublin  publisher, 
as  a  genuine  poem  of  Swift,  and  as  such  it  has  been  reprinted  in 
almost  every  edition  of  the  Dean's  works.  Even  Sir  Walter  Scott 
has  inserted  it  without  any  remark  in  his  edition  of  Swift's 
Works. 


THE  LOGICIANS  REFUTED.  195 

O'er  plains  they  ramble  unconfined, 

No  politics  disturb  their  mind  ; 

They  eat  their  meals,  and  take  their  sport, 

Nor  know  who's  in  or  out  at  court : 

They  never  to  the  levee  go 

To  treat  as  dearest  friend  a  foe  : 

They  never  importune  his  grace, 

Nor  ever  cringe  to  men  in  place  ; 

Nor  undertake  a  dirty  job, 

Nor  draw  the  quill  to  write  for  Bob.* 

Fraught  with  invective  they  ne'er  go 

To  folks  at  Paternoster  Row  : 

No  judges,  fiddlers,  dancing-masters, 

No  pickpockets,  or  poetasters, 

Are  known  to  honest  quadrupeds ; 

No  single  brute  his  fellow  leads, 

Brutes  never  meet  in  bloody  fray, 

Nor  cut  each  other's  throats  for  pay. 

Of  beasts,  it  is  confess'd.  the  ape 

Comes  nearest  us  in  human  shape : 

Like  man,  he  imitates  each  fashion. 

And  malice  is  his  ruling  passion : 

But  both  in  malice  and  grimaces, 

A  courtier  any  ape  surpasses. 

Behold  him  humbly  cringing  wait 

Upon  the  minister  of  state  ; 

View  him  soon  after  to  inferiors 

Aping  the  conduct  of  superiors: 

He  promises  with  equal  air, 

And  to  perform  takes  equal  care. 

He  in  his  turn  finds  imitators ; 

At  court  the  porters,  lacqueys,  waiters, 

*  Sir  Kobort  Walpole, 

88— Q  &  G— I 


196  A  NEW  SIMILE. 

Their  masters'  manners  still  contract, 
And  footmen,  lords  and  dukes  can  act. 
Thus  at  the  court,  both  great  and  small 
Behave  alike,  for  all  ape  all. 


A  NEW  SIMILE. 

IN  THE  MANNER  OF  SWIFT. 

Long  had  I  sought  in  vain  to  find 
A  likeness  for  the  scribbling  kind — 
The  modern  scribbling  kind,  who  write 
In  wit,  and  sense,  and  nature's  spite — 
Till  reading — I  forgot  what  day  on — 
A  chapter  out  of  Tooke's  Pantheon, 
I  think  I  met  with  something  there 
To  suit  my  purpose  to  a  hair. 
But  let  us  not  proceed  too  furious, — 
First  please  to  turn  to  god  Mercurius ; 
You'll  find  him  pictured  at  full  length, 
In  book  the  second,  page  the  tenth  ; 
The  stress  of  all  my  proofs  on  him  I  lay, 
And  now  proceed  we  to  our  simile. 
Imprimis,  pray  observe  his  hat, 
Wings  upon  either  side — mark  that; 
Well  ?  what  is  it  from  thence  we  gather  f  i 
Why,  these  denote  a  brain  of  feather. 
A  brain  of  feather !  very  right ; 
With  wit  that's  flighty,  learning  light ; 
Such  as  to  modern  bard's  decreed : 
A  just  comparison — proceed. 


A  NEW  SIMILE.  197 

In  the  next  place,  his  feet  peruse, 
Wings  grow  again  from  both  his  shoes ; 
Design'd  no  doubt,  their  part  to  bear, 
And  waft  his  godship  through  the  air : 
And  here  my  simile  unites  ; 
For  in  a  modern  poet's  flights, 
I'm  sure  it  may  be  justly  said, 
His  feet  are  useful  as  his  head. 

Lastly,  vouchsafe  t'  observe  his  hand^ 
Fill'd  with  a  snake- encircled  wand. 
By  classic  authors  term'd  caduceus, 
And  highly  famed  for  several  uses: 
To  wit, — most  wondrously  endued, 
No  poppy- water  half  so  good  ; 
For  let  folks  only  get  a  touch, 
Its  soporific  virtue's  such, 
Though  ne'er  so  much  awake  before, 
That  quickly  they  begin  to  snore  ; 
Add,  too,  what  certain  writers  tell, 
With  this  he  drives  men's  souls  to  helL 

Now,  to  apply,  begin  we  then  : — 
Ilis  wand's  a  modern  author's  pen ; 
The  serpents  round  about  it  twin'd 
Denote  him  of  the  reptile  kind. 
Denote  the  rage  with  which  he  writes, 
His  frothy  slaver,  venom'd  bites  ; 
An  equal  semblance  still  to  keep, 
Alike,  too,  both  conduce  to  sleep; 
This  difference  only,  as  the  god 
Drove  souls  to  Tart'rus  with  his  rod, 
With  his  goose-quill  the  scribbling  el^ 
Instead  of  others,  damns  himself. 
And  here  my  simile  almost  tript. 


198  DESCRIPTION  OF  A  BED-CHAMBEB. 

Yet  grant  a  word  by  way  of  postscript. 

Moreover,  Merc'ry  had  a  failing ; 

"Well !  what  of  that  ?  out  with  it — stealing. 

In  which  all  modern  bards  agree, 

Being  each  as  great  a  thief  as  be. 

But  e'en  this  deity's  existence 

Shall  lend  my  simile  assistance : 

Our  modern  bards !  why,  what  a  pox. 

Are  they  but  senseless  stones  and  blocks  % 


DESCRIPTION 

OF  AN 

AUTHOR'S  BED-CHAMBER. 

Where  the  Red  Lion,  staring  o'er  the  way, 
Invites  each  passing  stranger  that  can  pay  ; 
Where  Calvert's  butt,  and  Parson's  black  champagne, 
Regale  the  drabs  and  bloods  of  Drury-lane  : 
There,  in  a  lonely  room,  from  bailiffs  snug, 
The  Muse  found  Scroggin  stretched  beneath  a  rug ; 
A  window,  patch'd  with  paper,  lent  a  ray. 
That  dimly  show'd  the  state  in  which  he  lay  ; 
The  sanded  floor  that  grits  beneath  the  tread  ; 
The  humid  wall  with  paltry  pictures  spread ; 
The  royal  game  of  goose  was  there  in  view, 
And  the  twelve  rules  the  Royal  Martyr  drew ; 
The  Seasons,  framed  with  listing,  found  a  place. 
And  brave  Prince  William  show'd  his  lamp-black  face. 
The  morn  was  cold ;  he  views  with  keen  desire 
The  rusty  grate  unconscious  of  a  lire  ; 


'A  PROLOGUE,  199 

With  beer  and  milk  arrears  the  frieze  was  scored, 
And  five  crack'd  tea-cups  dress'd  the  chimney  board, 
A  nightcap  deck'd  his  brows  instead  of  bay, 
A  cap  by  night — a  stocking  all  the  day  1  * 


A  PEOLOGUE, 

WRITTEN  AND  SPOKEN  BY  THE  POET  LABERIUS,  A  ROMAN 
KNIGHT,WH0M  C^SAR  FORCED  UPON  THE  STAGE. 

[Preserved  by  Macrobius.] 

What  !  no  way  left  to  shun  th'  inglorious  stage 
And  save  from  infamy  my  sinking  age ! 
Scarce  half  alive,  oppress'd  with  many  a  year, 
What  in  the  name  of  dotage  drives  me  here  ? 
A  time  there  was  when  glory  was  my  guide, 
Nor  force  nor  fraud  could  turn  my  steps  aside ; 
Unawed  by  power,  and  unappall'd  by  fear, 
With  honest  thrift  I  held  my  honor  dear  : 
But  this  vile  hour  disperses  all  my  store, 
And  all  my  hoard  of  honor  is  no  more  ; 
For,  ah  !  too  partial  to  ray  life's  decline, 
Caesar  persuades,  submission  must  be  mine ; 
Him  I  obey,  whom  Heaven  itself  obeys. 
Hopeless  of  pleasing,  yet  inclined  to  please. 
Here  then  at  once  I  welcome  every  shame. 
And  cancel,  at  threescore,  a  life  of  fame : 
No  more  my  titles  shall  my  children  tell, 
The  old  buffoon  will  fit  mv  name  as  well : 
This  day  beyond  its  term  my  fate  extends, 
For  life  is  ended  when  our  honor  ends. 

*The  author  has  pn"^en,  with  a  very  Rlip:ht  alteration,  a  similar 
descriptiou  of  the  alehoiuie  in  the  Deserted  Village. 


200  TEE  GLORY  OF  HER  SE2[. 


AN  ELEGY  ON  THE  GLORY  OF  HER  SEX^ 
MRS.  MARY  BLAIZE. 

Good  people  all,  with  one  accord, 

Lament  for  Madam  Blaize, 
Who  never  wanted  a  good  word^- 

From  those  who  spoke  her  praise. 

The  needy  seldom  pass'd  her  door, 

And  alway  found  her  kind  ; 
She  freely  lent  to  all  the  poor — 

Who  left  a  pledge  behind. 

She  strove  the  neighborhood  to  please 
With  manners  wondrous  winning  j 

And  never  follow'd  wicked  ways — 
Unless  when  she  was  sinning. 

At  church,  in  silks  and  satin  new, 

With  hoop  of  monstrous  size, 
She  never  slumber'd  in  her  pew— 

But  when  she  shut  her  eyes. 

Her  love  was  sought,  I  do  aver, 

By  twenty  beaux  and  more  ; 
The  king  himself  has  follow'd  her— 

When  she  has  walk'd  before. 

But  now,  her  wealth  and  finery  fled, 

Her  hangers-on  cut  short  all ; 
The  doctors  found,  when  she  was  deaa— 

Her  last  disorder  mortal. 


STANZAS.  201 

Let  us  lament  in  sorrow  sore, 
For  Kent  Street  well  may  say, 

That  had  she  lived  a  twelvemonth  more- 
She  had  not  died  to-day. 


ON  A  BEAUTIFUL  YOUTH 

STRUCK  BUND  BY  LIGHTNING. 

Sure,  'twas  by  Providence  design'd. 

Rather  in  pity  than  in  hate. 
That  he  should  be,  like  Cupid,  blind. 

To  save  him  from  Narcissus'  fate. 


THE  CLOWN'S   REPLY. 

John  Trott  was  desired  by  two  witty  peers 

To  tell  them  the  reason  why  asses  had  ears  ; 

"An't  please  you,"  quoth  John,  "  I'm  not  given  to  letters. 

Nor  dare  I  pretend  to  know  more  than  my  betters ; 

Howe'er  from  this  time,  I  shall  ne'er  see  your  graces — 

As  I  hope  to  be  saved ! — without  thinking  on  asses." 


EPITAPH  ON  DR.  PARNELL. 

This  tomb,  inscribed  to  gentle  Parnell's  name, 

May  speak  our  gratitude,  but  not  his  fame. 

"What  heart  but  feels  his  sweetly  moral  lay. 

That  leads  to  truth  through  pleasure's  flowery  way  ? 

Celestial  themes  confess'd  his  tuneful  aid  ; 

And  Heaven,  that  lent  him  genius,  was  repaid. 


202  STANZAS. 

Needless  to  him  the  tribute  we  bestow, 

The  transitory  breath  of  fame  below : 

More  lasting  rapture  from  his  works  shall  risCj 

While  converts  thank  their  poet  in  the  skies. 


EPITAPH  ON  EDWAED  PUEDON  * 

Here  lies  Ned  Purdon,  from  misery  freed, 
Who  long  was  a  bookseller's  hack  : 

He  led  such  a  damnable  life  in  this  world, 
I  don't  think  he'll  wish  to  come  back. 


STANZAS  ON  THE  TAKING  OF  QUEBEC. 

Amidst  the  clamor  of  exulting  joys, 

Which  triumph  forces  from  the  patriot  heart, 

Grief  dares  to  mingle  her  soul-piercing  voice, 
And  quells  the  raptures  which  from  pleasure  start, 

O  Wolfe  !  t  to  thee  a  streaming  flood  of  woe 
Sighing  we  pay,  and  think  e'en  conquest  dear ; 

Quebec  in  vain  shall  teach  our  breast  to  glow, 
Whilst  thy  sad  fate  extorts  the  heart-wrung  tear. 

*  This  gentleman  was  educated  at  Trinity  College,  Dublin  ;  but 
having  wasted  his  patrimony,  he  enlisted  as  a  foot  soldier. 
Growing  tired  of  that  employment,  he  obtained  his  discharge, 
and  became  a  scribbler  in  the  newspapers.  He  translated  Vol- 
taire's Renriade. 

t  Goldsmith  claimed  relationship  with  this  gallant  soldier, 
■whose  character  he  greatly  admired. 


STANZAS.  203 

Alive,  the  foe  thy  dreadful  vigor  fled, 

And  saw  thee  fall  with  joy-pronouncing  eyes  : 

yet  they  shall  know  thou  conquerest,  though  dead  1 
Since  from  thy  tomb  a  thousand  heroes  rise. 


STANZAS  ON  WOMAN. 

"When  lovely  woman  stoops  to  folly, 
And  finds  too  late  that  men  betray, 

What  charm  can  soothe  her  melancholy  ? 
What  art  can  wash  her  guilt  away  3 

The  only  art  her  guilt  to  cover, 
To  hide  her  shame  from  every  eye, 

To  give  repentance  to  her  lover, 
And  wring  his  bosom,  is — to  die. 


A  SONNET.* 

Weeping,  murmuring,  complaining, 

Lost  to  every  gay  delight, 
Myra,  too  sincere  for  feigning, 

Fears  th'  approaching  bridal  night. 

Yet  why  impair  thy  bright  perfection, 
Or  dim  thy  beauty  with  a  tear  ? 

Had  Myra  followed  my  direction. 
She  long  had  wanted  cause  of  fear. 

*This  sonnet  is  imitated  from  a  French  madrigal  of  St.  Pa  vies. 


204  SONGS. 

SONG. 

From  the  Oratorio  of  the  Captivity. 

The  wretch  condemned  with  life  to  part, 

Still,  still  on  hope  relies ; 
And  every  pang  that  rends  the  heart 

Bids  expectation  rise. 

Hope,  like  the  glimmering  taper's  light, 
Adorns  and  cheers  the  way  ; 

And  still,  as  darker  grows  the  night, 
Emits  a  brighter  ray. 


SONG. 

From  the  Oratorio  of  the  Captivity. 
O  MEMORY  !  thou  fond  deceiver. 

Still  importunate  and  vain. 
To  former  joys  recurring  ever. 

And  turning  all  the  past  to  pain. 

Thou,  like  the  world,  the  oppress'd  oppressing. 
Thy  smiles  increase  the  wretch's  woe  ; 

And  he  who  wants  each  other  blessing, 
In  thee  must  ever  find  a  foe. 


SONG. 

Intended  to  have  been  sung  in  the  Comedy  of  She  Stoops  to 
Conquer,  but  omitted,  because  Mrs.  Bulkley,  who  acted  the 
part  of  Miss  Hardcastle,  could  not  sing. 

Ah  me  !  when  shall  I  marry  me  ? 

Lovers  are  plenty,  but  fail  to  relieve  me ; 

He,  fond  youth,  that  could  carry  me. 

Offers  to  love,  but  means  to  deceive  me. 


PROLOGUE  TO  ZOBEIDE.  205 

But  1  will  rally,  and  combat  the  ruiner : 

Not  a  look,  nor  a  smile,  shall  my  passion  discover. 

She  that  gives  all  to  the  false  one  pursuing  her. 
Makes  but  a  penitent,  and  loses  a  lover. 


PROLOGUE  TO  ZOBEIDE,  A  TRAGEDY ; 

WRITTEN  BY  JOSEPH  CRADOCK,  ESQ.,  ACTED  AT  THE 
THEATRE  ROYAL,  COVENT  GARDEN,  1772. 

SPOKEN   BY  MR.  QUICK. 

In  these  bold  times,  when  Learning's  sons  explore 

The  distant  climates  and  the  savage  shore  ; 

"When  wise  astronomers  to  India  steer. 

And  quit  for  Venus  many  a  brighter  here ; 

"While  botanists,  all  cold  to  smiles  and  dimpling, 

Forsake  the  fair,  and  patiently — go  simpling : 

Our  bard  into  the  general  spirit  enters. 

And  fits  his  little  frigate  for  adventures. 

"With  Scythian  stores,  and  trinkets  deeply  laden. 

He  this  way  steers  his  course,  in  hopes  of  trading  ; 

Yet  ere  he  lands  he's  ordered  me  before, 

To  make  an  observation  on  the  shore. 

"Where  are  we  driven  ?  our  reckoning  sure  is  lost ! 

This  seems  a  rocky  and  a  dangerous  coast. 

Lord,  what  a  sultry  climate  am  I  under ! 

Yon  ill-foreboding  cloud  seems  big  with  thunder : 

[  Upper  Gallery. 
There  mangroves   spread,  and  larger  than   I've  seen 
'em—  [Pit. 

Here  trees  of  stately  size — and  billing  turtles  in  'em. 

\_Bal  conies. 
Here  ill-condition'd  oranges  abound —  [Stage. 


206  EPILOGUE  TO  THE  SISTERS. 

And  apples,  bitter  apples,  strew  the  ground : 

[Tasting  them. 
The  inhabitants  are  cannibals,  1  fear  : 
1  heard  a  hissing — there  are  serpents  here  ! 
Oh  !  there  the  people  are — best  keep  my  distance  : 
Our  Captain,  gentle  natives,  craves  assistance  ; 
Our  ship's  well  stored — in  yonder  creek  we've  laid  her, 
His  honor  is  no  mercenary  trader. 
This  is  his  first  adventure  :  lend  him  aid, 
And  we  may  chance  to  drive  a  thriving  trade. 
His  goods,  he  hopes,  are  prime,  and  brought  from  far, 
Equally  fit  for  gallantry  and  war. 
What !  no  reply  to  promises  so  ample  ? 
I'd  best  step  back — and  order  up  a  sample. 


EPILOGUE 

TO  THE  COMEDY  OF  THE  SISTERS.* 

"What!  five  long  acts — and  all  to  make  us  wiser, 
Our  authoress  sure  has  wanted  an  adviser. 
Had  she  consulted  me,  she  should  have  made 
Her  moral  play  a  speaking  masquerade  : 
Warm'd  up  each  bustling  scene,  and  in  her  rage. 
Have  emptied  all  the  green-room  on  the  stage. 
My  life  on't  this  had  kept  her  play  from  sinking, 
Have  pleased  our  eyes,  and  saved  the  pain  of  thinking. 
"Well,  since  she  thus  has  shown  her  want  of  skill, 
"What  if  /  give  a  masquerade  ? — I  will. 

*  By  Mrs,  Charlotte  Lennox,  author  of  the  Female  Quixote, 
Shakspeare  Illustrated,  etc.  It  was  performed  one  night  only  at 
Covent  Garden,  in  1769.  This  lady  was  praised  by  Dr.  Johnsoa 
as  the  cleverest  female  writer  of  her  age. 


EPILOGUE  TO  THE  SISTERS.  207 

But  how  ?  ay,  there's  the  rub  !  \j)ausi?ig']  I've  got  my 

cue : 
The  world's  a  masquerade !  the   masquers,  you,  you, 

you.  [To  Boxes,  Pit,  and  Gallery. 

Lud  !  what  a  group  the  motley  scene  discloses ! 
False  wit,  false  wives,  false  virgins,  and  false  spouses  1 
Statesmen  with  bridles  on  ;  and,  close  beside  'em, 
Patriots  in  party-color'd  suits  that  ride  'em  : 
There  Hebes,  turn'd  of  fifty,  try  once  more 
To  raise  a  flame  in  Cupids  of  threescore  ; 
These  in  their  turn,  with  appetites  as  keen, 
Deserting  fifty,  fasten  on  fifteen  : 
Miss,  not  yet  full  fifteen,  with  fire  uncommon, 
Flings  down  her  sampler,  and  takes  up  the  woman : 
The  little  urchin  smiles,  and  spreads  her  lure. 
And  tries  to  kill,  ere  she's  got  power  to  cure. 
Thus  't  is  with  all  :  their  chief  and  constant  care 
Is  to  seem  everything — but  what  they  are. 
Yon  broad,  bold,  angry  spark,  I  fix  my  eye  on. 
Who  seems  t'  have  robb'd  his  vizor  from  the  lion  ; 
"Who  frowns,  and  talks,  and  swears,  with  round  parade, 
Looking,  as  who  should  say,  Damme  !  who's  afraid  ? 

[Mi?nicking, 
Strip  but  this  vizor  off,  and,  sure  I  am 
You'll  find  his  lionship  a  very  lamb : 
Yon  politician,  famous  in  debate. 
Perhaps,  to  vulgar  eyes,  bestrides  the  state  ; 
Yet,  when  he  deigns  his  real  shape  t'  assume, 
He  turns  old  woman,  and  bestrides  a  broom. 
Yon  patriot,  too,  who  presses  on  your  sight, 
And  seems,  to  every  gazer,  all  in  white. 
If  with  a  bribe  his  candor  you  attack, 
lie  bows,  turns  round,  and  whip — the  man's  in  black : 


208  EPILOGUE. 

Yon  critic,  too — but  whither  do  I  run? 

If  I  proceed,  our  bard  will  be  undone  ! 
"Well,  then,  a  truce,  since  she  requests  it  too, 
Do  you  spare  her,  and  I'll  for  once  spare  you. 


EPILOGUE, 

SPOKEN  BY 

MRS.  BULKLEY  AND  MISS  CATLEY. 

Enter  Mi'S.  Biilkley,  tvho  courtesies  very  low,  as  beginning  to 
speak.  Then  enter  Miss  Catley,  who  stands  full  before  her,  and 
courtesies  to  th(  audience. 

Mrs.  BulTdey.     Hold,  Ma'am,  your  pardon.    What's 
your  business  here  ? 

Mi^s  Catley.     The  Epilogue. 

Mrs.  B.     The  Epilogue  ? 

Miss.  C.     Yes,  the  Epilogue,  my  dear. 

Mrs.    B.      Sure,   you   mistake,    Ma'am.     The  Epi- 
logue ?     /  bring  it. 

Miss.  C.     Excuse  me,  Ma'am.     The  author  bid  me 
sing  it. 

Hecitative. 

Ye  beaux  and  belles,  that  form  this  splendid  ring. 
Suspend  your  conversation  while  I  sing. 

Mrs.  B.      Why  sure,  the  girl 's  beside  herself  ?  an 
Epilogue  of  singing? 
A  hopeful  end,  indeed,  to  such  a  blest  beginning. 
Besides,  a  singer  in  a  comic  set — 
Excuse  me,  Ma'am,  I  know  the  etiquette. 

Miss.  C.     What  if  we  leave  it  to  the  house  ? 

Mrs.  B.     The  house  ? — Agreed. 


EPILOGUE.  209 

Miss  G.     Agreed. 

Mrs.  B.    And  she  whose  party's  largest  shall  pro- 
ceed. 
And  first,  I  hope  you'll  readily  agree 
I've  all  the  critics  and  the  wits  for  me. 
They,  I  am  sure,  will  answer  my  commands  : 
Ye  candid  judging  few,  hold  up  your  hands. 
"What !  no  return  ?     I  find  too  late,  I  fear, 
That  modern  judges  seldom  enter  here. 

Miss  0.     I'm  for  a  different  set : — Old  men,  whose 
trade  is 
Still  to  gallant  and  dangle  with  the  ladies. 

Recitative. 
Who  mump  their  passion,  and  who,  grimly  smiling, 
Still  thus  address  the  fair  with  voice  beguiling : 

Air. — Cotillon. 

Turn,  my  fairest,  turn,  if  ever 

Strephon  caught  thy  ravish'd  eye, 
Pity  take  on  your  swain  so  clever. 
Who  without  your  aid  must  die. 

Yes,  I  shall  die,  hu,  hu,  hu,  hu ! 
Yes,  I  must  die,  ho,  ho,  ho,  ho  ! 

Da  Capo. 

Mrs.  B.     Let  all  the  old  pay  homage  to  your  merit ; 
Give  me  the  young,  the  gay,  the  men  of  spirit. 
Ye  travell'd  tribe,  ye  macaroni  train. 
Of  French  friseurs  and  nosegays  justly  vain, 
Who  take  a  trip  to  Paris  once  a-year, 
To  dress,  and  look  like  awkward  Frenchmen  here, — 
Lifnd  me  your  hands :  O,  fatal  news  to  tell, 
Their  hands  are  only  lent  to  the  Heinelle. 


210  EPILOGUE. 

Miss  C.    Ay,  take  your  travellers — travellers  indeed, 
Give  me  my  bonny  Scot,  that  travels  from  the  Tweed. 
Where  are  the  chiels  ?  Ah,  ah,  I  well  discern 
The  smiling  looks  of  each  bewitching  bairn. 

Air. — A  honnie  young  lad  is  my  Jockey. 

I'll  sing  to  amuse  you  by  night  and  by  day, 

And  be  unco  merry  when  you  are  but  gay ; 

When  you  with  your  bagpipes  are  ready  to  play, 

My  voice  shall  be  ready  to  carol  away 

With  Sandy,  and  Sawney,  and  Jockey, 
With  Sawnie,  and  Jarvie,  and  Jockey. 

Mrs.  B.     Ye  gamesters,  who,  so  eager  in  pursuit, 
Make  but  of  all  your  fortune  one  va  toute  : 
Ye  jockey  tribe,  whose  stock  of  words  are  few, 
"  I  hold  the  odds — Done,  done,  with  you,  with  you.'* 
Ye  barristers,  so  fluent  with  grimace, 
"  My  Lord,  your  Lordship  misconceives  the  case ;  " 
Doctors,  who  answer  every  misfortuner, 
"  1  wish  I'd  been  call'd  in  a  little  sooner  :  " 
Assist  my  cause  with  hands  and  voices  hearty, 
Come,  end  the  contest  here,  and  aid  my  party. 

Air. — Ballinamony. 

Miss  C.     Ye  brave  Irish  lads,  hark  away  to  the  cracky 
Assist  me,  I  pray,  in  this  woeful  attack  ; 
j'or — sure,  I  don't  wrong  you — you  seldom  are  slack. 
When  the  ladies  are  calling,  to  blush  and  hang  back. 
For  you  are  always  so  polite  and  attentive, 
Still  to  amuse  us  inventive, 
.  And  death  is  your  only  preventive  ; 
Your  hands  and  voices  for  me. 


EPILOGUE.  211 

Mrs.  B.    Well,  Madam,  what  if,  after  all  this  spar- 
ring, we  both  agree,  like  friends,  to  end  our  jarring  ? 

Miss  C.     And  that  our  friendship  may  remain  un- 
broken, 
What  if  we  leave  the  Epilogue  unspoken  ? 

Mrs.  B.     Agreed. 

Miss  C.     Agreed. 

Mrs.  B.     And  now  with  late  repentance, 
Un-epilogued  the  Poet  waits  his  sentence. 
Condemn  the  stubborn  fool,  who  can't  submit 
To  thrive  by  flattery,  though  he  starves  by  wit. 

Exeunt, 


AN    EPILOGUE. 

INTENDED   FOR   MRS.    BULKLEY. 

There  is  a  place — so  Ariosto  sings — 

A  treasury  for  lost  and  missing  things. 

Lost  human  wits  have  places  there  assign'd  them, 

And  they  who  lose  their  senses,  there  may  find  them, 

But  Where's  this  place,  this  storehouse  of  the  age  ? 

The  Moon,  says  he  ;  but  I  affirm,  the  Stage — 

At  least,  in  many  things  I  think  I  see. 

His  lunar  and  our  mimic  world  agree : 

Both  shine  at  night,  for,  but  at  Foote's  alone, 

We  scarce  exhibit  till  the  sun  goes  down  : 

Both  prone  to  change,  no  settled  limits  fix, 

And  sure  the  folks  of  both  are  lunatics. 

But  in  this  parallel  my  best  pretence  is. 

That  mortals  visit  both  to  find  their  senses; 

To  this  strange  spot,  Kakes,  Macaronies,  Cits, 

Come  thronging  to  collect  their  scatter'd  wits. 


212  EPILOGUE. 

The  gay  coquette,  who  ogles  all  the  day, 
Comes  here  at  night,  and  goes  a  prude  away. 
Hither  th'  affected  city  dame  advancing, 
Who  sighs  for  Operas,  and  doats  on  dancing, 
Taught  by  our  art,  her  ridicule  to  pause  on, 
Quits  the  Ballet,  and  calls  for  Nancy  Dawson. 
The  Gamester,  too,  whose  wit's  all  high  or  low, 
Oft  risks  his  fortune  on  one  desperate  throw, 
Comes  here  to  saunter,  having  made  his  bets, 
Finds  his  lost  senses  out,  and  pays  his  debts. 
The  Mohawk,  too,  with  angry  phrases  stored — 
As,  "  Damme,  Sir !  "  and  "  Sir,  I  wear  a  sword  1 " 
Here  lesson'd  for  a  while,  and  hence  retreating, 
Goes  out,  affronts  his  man,  and  takes  a  beating. 
Here  comes  the  sons  of  scandal  and  of  news. 
But  find  no  sense — for  they  have  none  to  lose. 
Of  all  the  tribe  here  wanting  an  adviser, 
Our  Author's  the  least  likely  to  grow  wiser ; 
Has  he  not  seen  how  you  your  favor  place 
On  sentimental  queens,  and  lords  in  lace  % 
Without  a  star,  a  coronet,  or  garter. 
How  can  the  piece  expect  or  hope  for  quarter  ? 
No  high-life  scenes,  no  sentiment :  the  creature 
Still  stoops  among  the  low  to  copy  Nature. 
Yes,  he's  far  gone :  and  yet  some  pity  fix, 
The  English  laws  forbid  to  punish  lunatics. 


EPILOGUE.  213 


EPILOGUE, 

SPOKEN  BY  MR.    LEE   LEWES,    IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF 
HARLEQUIN,   AT   HIS  BENEFIT. 

Hold  !  Prompter,  hold  !  a  word  before  your  nonsense, 
I'd  speak  a  word  or  two,  to  ease  my  conscience. 
My  pride  forbids  it  ever  should  be  said 
My  heels  eclipse  the  honors  of  my  head  ; 
That  I  found  humor  in  a  piebald  vest. 
Or  ever  thought  that  jumping  was  a  jest. 

[  Takes  of  his  mask. 
"Whence,  and  what  art  thou,  visionary  birth  ? 
Nature  disowns,  and  reason  scorns  thy  mirth : 
In  thy  black  aspect  every  passion  sleeps, 
The  joy  that  dimples,  and  the  woe  that  weeps. 
How  hast  thou  fill'd  the  scene  with  all  thy  brood 
Of  fools  pursuing  and  of  fools  pursued ! 
Whose  ins  and  outs  no  ray  of  sense  discloses, 
Whose  only  plot  it  is  to  break  our  noses  ; 
Whilst  from  below  the  trap-door  demons  rise, 
And  from  above  the  dangling  deities  : 
And  shall  1  mix  in  this  unhallow'd  crew  ? 
May  rosin'd  lightning  blast  me  if  I  do ! 
No — I  will  act — I'll  vindicate  the  stage: 
Shakspeare  himself  shall  feel  my  tragic  rage. 
Off  !  off!  vile  trappings!  a  new  passion  reigns! 
The  madd'ning  monarch  revels  in  my  veins. 
Oh !  for  a  Richard's  voice  to  catch  the  theme, — 
"  Give  me  another  horse  !  bind  up  my  wounds  ! '' — soft^ 
'twas  but  a  dream. 


214  EPILOGUE. 

Ay,  'twas  but  a  dream,  for  now  there's  no  retreating, 

If  I  cease  Harlequin,  I  cease  from  eating. 

'Twas  thus  that  ^sop's  stag,  a  creature  blameless, 

Yet  something  vain,  like  one  that  shall  be  nameless, 

Once  on  the  margin  of  a  fountain  stood 

And  cavill'd  at  his  image  in  the  flood  : 

"  The  deuce   confound,"   he  cries,    "  these  drumstick 
shanks. 

They  never  have  my  gratitude  nor  thanks  ; 

They're  perfectly  disgraceful !  strike  me  dead  ! 

But  for  a  head,  yes,  yes,  I  have  a  head : 

How  piercing  is  that  eye !  how  sleek  that  brow ! 

My  horns  ! — I'm  told  that  horns  are  the  fashion  now.'* 
Whilst  thus  he  spoke,  astonish'd  to  his  view, 

Near,  and  more  near,  the  hounds  and  huntsmen  drew ; 

"  Hoicks !  hark  forward !  "  came  thund'ring  from  be- 
hind. 

He  bounds  aloft,  outstrips  the  fleeting  wind ; 

He  quits  the  woods,  and  tries  the  beaten  ways ; 

He  starts,  he  pants,  he  takes  the  circling  maze : 

At  length,  his  silly  head,  so  prized  before, 

Is  taught  his  former  folly  to  deplore ; 

Whilst  his  strong  limbs  conspire  to  set  him  free, 

And  at  one  bound  he  saves  himself — like  me, 

\_Taking  a  jump  through  the  stage  door. 


TERENODIA  AUGUSTALIS.  515 


THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS  * 

SACRED  TO  THE  MEMORY  OP  HER  LATE  ROYAL  HIGHNESS  THE 

PRINOESS  DOWAGEE  OF  WALES. 

SPOKEN  AND  SUNG  IN  THE  GREAT  ROOM   IN  SOHO-SQUARE, 

Thursday,  the  30tli  day  of  February,  1772. 


ADVERTISEMENT. 

The  following  may  more  properly  be  termed  a  com- 
pilation than  a  poem.  It  was  prepared  for  the  com- 
poser in  little  more  than  two  days :  and  may  therefore 
rather  be  considered  as  an  industrious  effort  of  grati- 
tude than  of  genius. 

In  justice  to  the  composer,  it  may  likewise  be  right 
to  inform  the  public,  that  the  music  was  adapted  in  a 
period  of  time  equally  short. 

Speakers. — Mr.  Lee  and  Mrs.  Bellamy. 
Singers.— Ji/r.  Champnes,  Mr.  Dine,  and  Miss  Jameson. 

THE  MUSIC  PREPARED  AND  ADAPTED  BY  SIGNIOR  VENTO. 

*  This  poem  was  first  printed  in  Chalmer's  edition  of  the  Eng" 
lish  Poets,  from  a  copy  given  by  Goldsmith  to  his  friend,  Joseph 
Cradock,  Esq.,  author  of  the  tragedy  of  Zobeide. 


216  TERENODIA  AUGUST ALIS. 

THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS. 

OVERTURE — A  SOLEMN  DIRGE. 
AIR— TRIO. 

Aeise,  ye  sons  of  worth,  arise, 
And  waken  every  note  of  woe ! 

When  truth  and  virtue  reach  the  skieSj 
'Tis  ours  to  weep  the  want  below. 

CHORUS. 

"When  truth  and  virtue,  etc. 

MAN  SPEAKER. 

The  praise  attending  pomp  and  power, 

The  incense  given  to  kings, 
Are  but  the  trappings  of  an  hour, 

Mere  transitory  things. 
The  base  bestow  them ;  but  the  good  agree 
To  spurn  the  venal  gifts  as  flattery. 
But  when  to  pomp  and  power  are  join'd 
An  equal  dignity  of  the  mind  ; 

When  titles  are  the  smallest  claim  ; 
When  wealth  and  rank,  and  noble  blood, 
But  aid  the  power  of  doing  good  : 

Then  all  their  trophies  last — and  flattery  turns  to 
fame. 
Blest  spirit,  thou,  whose  fame,  just  born  to  bloom, 
Shall  spread  and  flourish  from  the  tomb. 

How  hast  thou  left  mankind  for  Heaven ! 
Even  now  reproach  and  faction  mourn, 
And,  wondering  how  their  rage  was  born, 


TRRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS.  217 

Kequest  to  be  forgiven ! 
Alas  !  they  never  had  thy  hate ; 

Unmoved,  in  conscious  rectitude, 

Thy  towering  mind  self-centred  stood, 
Nor  wanted  man's  opinion  to  be  great. 

In  vain,  to  charm  the  ravish'd  sight, 
A  thousand  gifts  would  fortune  send  ; 

In  vain,  to  drive  thee  from  the  right, 
A  thousand  sorrows  urged  thy  end  : 
Like  some  well-fashion'd  arch  thy  patience  stood 
And  purchased  strength  from  its  increased  load. 
Pain  met  thee  like  a  friend  to  set  thee  free, 
Affliction  still  is  virtue's  opportunity  ! 
Virtue,  on  herself  relying, 

Every  passion  hushed  to  rest. 
Loses  every  pain  of  dying 

In  the  hopes  of  being  blest. 
Every  added  pang  she  suffers 

Some  increasing  good  bestows, 
And  every  shock  that  malice  offers 

Only  rocks  her  to  repose. 

SONG.      BY  A  MAN. — AFFETUOSO. 

Virtue,  on  herself  relying,  etc. 

to 
Only  rocks  her  to  repose. 

WOMAN  SPEAKER. 

Yet  ah !   what  terrors  frown'd  upon  her  fate, 

Death,  with  its  formidable  band, 
fever,  and  pain,  and  pale  consumptive  care, 

Determined  took  their  stand. 


218  THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS. 

Nor  did  the  cruel  ravagers  design 

To  finish  all  their  efforts  at  a  blow ; 

But,  mischievously  slow, 
They  robb'd  the  relic  and  defaced  the  shrine. 

With  unavailing  grief, 

Despairing  of  relief, 
Her  weeping  children  round 

Beheld  each  hour 

Death's  growing  pow'r, 
And  trembled  as  he  frown'd. 
As  helpless  friends  who  view  from  shore 
The  laboring  ship,  and  hear  the  tempest  roar, 

While  winds  and  waves  their  wishes  cross, — 
They  stood,  while  hope  and  comfort  fail, 
Not  to  assist,  but  to  bewail 

The  inevitable  loss. 
Relentless  tyrant,  at  thy  call 
How  do  the  good,  the  virtuous  fall! 
Truth,  beauty,  worth,  and  all  that  most  engage, 
But  wake  thy  vengeance  and  provoke  thy  rage. 

SONG.     BY  A  MAN.— BASSO,  STOCCATO,  SPIRITUOSO. 

When  vice  my  dart  and  scythe  supply, 
How  great  a  King  of  Terrors  I ! 
If  folly,  fraud,  your  hearts  engage, 
Tremble,  ye  mortals,  at  my  rage ! 

Fall,  round  me  fall,  ye  little  things, 
Te  statesmen,  warriors,  poets,  kings. 
If  virtue  fail  her  counsel  sage, 
Tremble,  ye  mortals,  at  my  rage ! 

MAN  SPEAKEB. 

Yet  let  that  wisdom,  urged  by  her  example, 
Teach  us  to  estimate  what  all  must  suffer  : 


THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS.  219 

Let  us  prize  death  as  the  best  gift  of  nature, 

As  a  safe  inn  where  weary  travellers, 

When  they  have  journey'd  through  a  world  of  cares, 

May  put  off  life,  and  be  at  rest  forever. 

Groans,  weeping  friends,  indeed,  and  gloomy  sables. 

May  oft  distract  us  with  their  sad  solemnity, 

The  preparation  is  the  executioner. 

Death,  when  unmask'd,  shows  me  a  friendly  face, 

And  is  a  terror  only  at  a  distance  : 

!Nor  as  the  line  of  life  conducts  me  on 

To  Death's  great  court,  the  prospect  seems  more  fair, 

'Tis  Nature's  kind  retreat,  that's  always  open 

To  take  us  in  when  we  have  drained  the  cup 

Of  life,  or  worn  our  days  to  wretchedness. 

In  that  secure,  serene  retreat, 

Where  all  the  humble,  all  the  great. 

Promiscuously  recline ; 
Where  wildly  huddled  to  the  eye, 
The  beggar's  pouch,  and  prince's  purple  lie  : 

May  every  bliss  be  thine  ! 
And,  ah  !  blest  spirit,  wheresoe'er  thy  flight, 
Through  rolling  worlds,  or  fields  of  liquid  light. 
May  cherubs  welcome  their  expected  guest ! 
May  saints  with  songs  receive  thee  to  their  rest ! 
May  peace,  that  claim'd  while  here,  thy  warmest  love, 
May  blissful,  endless  peace  be  thine  above ! 

SONG.     BY  A  WOMAN. — AMOROSO. 

Lovely,  lasting  Peace,  below, 
Comforter  of  every  woe. 
Heavenly  born,  and  bred  on  high. 
To  crown  the  favorites  of  the  sky ! 

22— Q  &  G— J 


220  THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS. 

Lovely,  lasting  Peace,  appear ! 
This  world  itself,  if  thou  art  here, 
Is  once  again  with  Eden  blest. 
And  man  contains  it  in  his  breast. 

WOMAN   SPEAKER. 

Oar  vows  are  heard  !     Long,  long  to  mortal  eyes, 
Her  soul  was  flitting  to  its  kindred  skies : 
Celestial  like  her  bounty  fell, 
"Where  modest  "Want  and  patient  Sorrow  dwell ; 
"Want  pass'd  for  Merit  at  her  door, 

Unseen  the  modest  were  supplied. 
Her  constant  pity  fed  the  poor, — 

Then  only  poor,  indeed,  the  day  she  died. 
And,  oh  !  for  this,  while  sculpture  decks  thy  shrine, 

And  art  exhausts  profusion  round. 
The  tribute  of  a  tear  be  mine, 

A  simple  song,  a  sigh  profound. 
There  faith  shall  come — a  pilgrim  gray, 
To  bless  the  tomb  that  wraps  thy  clay ! 
And  calm  Religion  shall  repair 
To  dwell  a  weeping  hermit  there. 
Truth,  Fortitude,  and  Friendship  shall  agree 
To  blend  their  virtues  while  they  think  of  thee. 

AIR— CHORUS  POMPOSO. 

Let  us — let  all  the  world  agree, 
To  profit  by  resembling  thee. 


■'i 


PART  II. 

OVERTURE— PASTORALE. 
MAN  SPEAKER. 

Fast  by  that  shore  where  Thames'  translucent  stream, 


Reflects  new  glories  on  his  breast, 


THRENODIA  AUOUSTALIS.  231 

Where,  splendid  as  the  youthful  poet's  dream, 

He  forms  a  scene  beyond  Elysium  blest ; 
Where  sculptured  elegance  and  native  grace 
Unite  to  stamp  the  beauties  of  the  place ; 
While,  sweetly  blending,  still  are  seen 
The  wavy  lawn,  the  sloping  green  ; 
While  novelty,  with  cautious  cunning, 
Through  every  maze  of  fancy  running. 
From  China  borrows  aid  to  deck  the  scene : 
There,  sorrowing  by  the  river's  glassy  bed, 

Forlorn,  a  rural  band  complain'd, 
All  whom  Augusta's  bounty  fed. 

All  whom  her  clemency  sustain'd  ; 
The  good  old  sire,  unconscious  of  decay. 
The  modest  matron,  clad  in  home-spun  gray. 
The  military  boy,  the  orphan'd  maid, 
The  shatter'd  veteran  now  first  dismay'd, — 
These  sadly  join  beside  the  murmuring  deep, 

And,  as  they  view  the  towers  of  Kew, 
Call  on  their  mistress — now  no  more — and  weep. 

CHORUS. — AFFETUOSO,  LARGO. 

Ye  shady  walks,  ye  waving  greens. 

Ye  nodding  towers,  ye  fairy  scenes. 

Let  all  your  echoes  now  deplore. 

That  she  who  form'd  your  beauties  is  no  more. 

MAN  SPEAKER. 

First  of  the  train  the  patient  rustic  came. 
Whose  callous  hand  had  form'd  the  scene. 

Bending  at  once  with  sorrow  and  with  age, 
With  many  a  tear,  and  many  a  sigh  between : 


222  THEENODIA  AUGUSTALI8. 

"  And   where,"  he  cried,  "  shall  now  my  babes  have 
bread, 

Or  how  shall  age  support  its  feeble  fire  ? 
!No  lord  will  take  me  now,  my  vigor  fled, 

Nor  can  my  strength  perform  what  they  require, 
Each  grudging  master  keeps  the  laborer  bare, 
A  sleek  and  idle  race  is  all  their  care. 
My  noble  mistress  thought  not  so  : 

Her  bounty,  like  the  morning  dew, 
Unseen,  though  constant,  used  to  flow. 

And  as  my  strength  decay'd,  her  bounty  grew." 

WOMAN  SPEAKER. 

In  decent  dress,  and  coarsely  clean, 

The  pious  matron  next  was  seen, 

Clasp'd  in  her  hand  a  godly  book  was  borne, 

By  use  and  daily  meditation  worn  ; 

That  decent  dress,  this  holy  guide, 

Augusta's  cares  had  well  supplied. 

"  And  ah  !  "  she  cries,  all  woe-begone, 

"  What  now  remains  for  me  ? 
Oh  !  where  shall  weeping  want  repair 

To  ask  for  charity  ? 
Too  late  in  life  for  me  to  ask, 

And  shame  prevents  the  deed. 
And  tardy,  tardy  are  the  times 

To  succor,  should  I  need. 
But  all  my  wants,  before  I  spoke. 

Were  to  my  mistress  known  ; 
She  still  relieved,  nor  sought  my  praise. 

Contented  with  her  own. 
But  every  day  her  name  I'll  bless. 

My  morning  prayer,  my  evening  song, 


THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS.  223 

I'll  praise  her  while  my  life  shall  last, 
A  life  that  cannot  last  me  long." 

SONG.— BY  A  WOMAN. 

Each  day,  each  hour,  her  name  I'll  bless, 

My  morning  and  my  evening  song, 
And  when  in  death  my  vows  shall  cease, 

My  children  shall  the  note  prolong. 

MAN  SPEAKER. 

The  hardy  veteran  after  struck  the  sight, 

Scarr'd,  mangled,  maim'd  in  every  part, 
Lopp'd  of  his  limbs  in  many  a  gallant  fight, 

In  nought  entire — except  his  heart : 
Mute  for  a  while,  and  sullenly  distrest, 
At  last  th'  impetuous  sorrow  fired  his  breast  :— 

Wild  is  the  whirlwind  rolling 
O'er  Afric's  sandy  plain. 

And  wide  the  tempest  howling 
Along  the  billow'd  main  : 
But  every  danger  felt  before, 
The  raging  deep,  the  whirlwind's  roar. 
Less  dreadful  struck  me  with  dismay 
Than  what  I  feel  this  fatal  day. 
Oh,  let  me  fly  a  land  that  spurns  the  brave, 
Oswego's  dreary  shores  shall  be  my  grave ; 
I'll  seek  that  less  inhospitable  coast, 
And  lay  my  body  where  my  limbs  were  lost. 

SONG.— BY  A  MAN.— BASSO  SPIRITUOSO. 

Old  Edward's  sons,  unknown  to  yield, 
Shall  crowd  from  Cressy's  laurell'd  field. 
To  do  thy  memory  right : 


224  THRENODIA  AUGUSTALIS. 

For  thine  and  Britain's  wrongs  they  feel, 
Again  they  snatch  the  gleamy   steel, 
And  wish  th'  avenging  fight. 


WOMAN   SPEAKER. 

In  innocence  and  youth  complaining, 

Next  appear'd  a  lovely  maid  ; 
Affliction,  o'er  each  feature  reigning, 

Kindly  came  in  beauty's  aid  : 
Every  grace  that  grief  dispenses, 

Every  glance  that  warms  the  soul. 
In  sweet  succession  charms  the  senses, 

While  Pity  harmonized  the  whole. 
"  The  garland  of  beauty,"  'tis  thus  she  would  say, 

"  No  more  shall  my  crook  or  my  temples  adorn ; 
I'll  not  wear  a  garland — Augusta's  away — 

I'll  not  wear  a  garland  until  she  return. 
But,  alas !  that  return  I  never  shall  see  : 

The  echoes  of   Thames  shall  my  sorrows  proclaim, 
There  promised  a  lover  to  come — but,  ah  me  ! 

'Twas  death — 'twas  the  death  of  my  mistress  that 
came. 
But  ever,  forever,  her  image  shall  last, 

I'll  strip  all  the  Spring  of  its  earliest  bloom  ; 
On  her  grave  shall  the  cowslip  and  primrose  be  cast 

And  the  new-blossom'd  thorn  shall  whiten  her  tomb. 

SONa.— BY  A   WOMAN. — PASTORALE. 

"With  garlands  of  beauty  the  Queen  of  the  May 
No  more  will  her  crook  or  her  temples  adorn  ; 

For  who'd  wear  a  garland  when  she  is  away, 
When  she  is  removed,  and  shall  never  return ! 


TEE  CAPTIVITY:    AN  ORATORIO.  225 

On  the  grave  of  Augusta  these  garlands  be  placed, 
We'll  rifle  the  Spring. of  its  earliest  bloom, 

And  there  shall  the  cowslip  and  primrose  be  cast, 
And  the  new  blossom'd  thorn  shall  whiten  her  tomb. 

CHORUS. — ALTRO  MODO. 

On  the  grave  of  Augusta  this  garland  be  placed, 
"We'll  rifle  the  Spring  of  its  earliest  bloom, 

And  there  shall  the  cowslip  and  primrose  be  cast. 
And  the  tears  of  her  country  shall  water  her  tomb. 


THE  CAPTIVITY :  AK  ORATOKIO  * 

THE  PERSONS. 

J^irst  Jewish  Prophet.  First  Chaldean  Priest. 

Second  Jewish  Prophet.        Second  Chaldean  Priest. 
Isra^litish  Woman.  Chaldean    Woman. 

Choims  of  Youths  and  Virgins. 
Scene. — The  Banks  of  the  River  Euphrates  near  Babylon. 

ACT  THE   FIRST. 

FIRST    PROPHET. 

Ye  captive  tribes  that  hourly  work  and  weep 
Where  flows  Euphrates  murmuring  to  the  deep 
Suspend  your  woes  a  while,  the  task  suspend. 
And  turn  to  God,  your  father  and  your  friend  : 
Insulted,  chain'd,  and  all  the  world  our  foe. 
Our  God  alone  is  all  we  boast  below. 

*  This  was  first  printed  from  the  original,  in  Dr.   Goldsmith's 
own    handwriting,   in   the  8vo.   edition  of  his    Miscellaneous 
Work^,  published  in  1820. 
15 


226  THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO. 

Air. 

FIRST  PROPHET. 

Our  God  is  all  we  boast  below, 

To  him  we  turn  our  eyes ; 
And  every  added  weight  of  woe 
Shall  make  our  homage  rise. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

And  though  no  temple  richly  dress'd, 

Nor  sacrifice  is  here, 
We'll  make  his  temple  in  our  breast, 

And  offer  up  a  tear. 

l^The  first  stanza  repeated  hy  the  CHOEua 

ISRAELITISH  WOMAN. 

That  strain  once  more  !  it  bids  remembrance  rise, 

And  brings  my  long-lost  country  to  mine  eyes : 

Ye  fields  of  Sharon,  dress'd  in  flowery  pride, 

Ye  plains  where  Kedron  rolls  its  glassy  tide, 

Ye  hills  of  Lebanon,  with  cedars  crown'd, 

Ye  Gilead  groves,  that  fling  perfumes  around, — 

How  sweet  those  groves !  that  plain  how  wondrous 

fair ! 
How  doubly  sweet  when  Heaven  was  with  us  there ! 

Air. 

O  Memory  !  thou  fond  deceiver, 

Still  importunate  and  vain  ; 
To  former  joys  recurring  ever. 

And  turning  all  the  past  to  pain. 

Hence,  intruder  most  distressing  ! 

Seek  the  happy  and  the  free  : 
The  wretch  who  wants  each  other  blessing, 

Ever  wants  a  friend  in  thee. 


THE  CAPTIVITY:    AN  ORATORIO.  227 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

Yet  why  complain  ?     What   though   by  bonds  con- 
fined! 
Should  bonds  repress  the  vigor  of  the  mind  ? 
Have  we  not  cause  for  triumph,  when  we  see 
Ourselves  alone  from  idol  worship  free  ? 
Are  not,  this  very  morn,  those  feasts  begun 
"Where  prostrate  error  hails  the  rising  sun  ? 
Do  not  our  tyrant  lords  this  day  ordain 
For  superstitious  rites  and  mirth  profane? 
And  should  we  mourn  ?     Should  coward  virtue  fly, 
When  vaunting  folly  lifts  her  head  on  high  ? 
No  !  rather  let  us  triumph  still  the  more, 
And  as  our  fortune  sinks,  our  spirits  soar. 

Air. 

The  triumphs  that  on  vice  attend 
Shall  ever  in  confusion  end  ; 
The  good  man  suffers  but  to  gain, 
And  every  virtue  springs  from  pain : 
As  aromatic  plants  bestow 
No  spicy  fragrance  while  they  grow ; 
But  crush'd,  or  trodden  to  the  ground, 
Diffuse  their  balmy  sweets  around. 

FIRST    PROPHET. 

But  hush,  my  sons,  our  tyrant  lords  are  near, 

The  sounds  of  barbarous  pleasure  strike  mine  ear ; 

Triumphant  music  floats  along  the  vale, 

Near,  nearer  still,  it  gathers  on  the  gale : 

The  growing  sound  their  swift  approach  declares — 

Desist,  my  sons,  nor  mix  the  strain  with  theirs. 


228  THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO. 

Enter  Chat.dkan  Priests  attended. 

Air. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

Come  on,  my  companions,  the  triumph  display, 

Let  rapture  the  minutes  employ ; 
The  sun  calls  us  out  on  this  festival  day, 

And  our  monarch  partakes  in  the  joy. 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

Like  the  sun,  our  great  monarch  all  rapture  suppliesj 

Both  similar  blessings  bestow  : 
The  sun  with  his  splendor  illumines  the  skies, 

And  our  monarch  enlivens  below. 

Air. 

CHALDEAN  WOMAN. 

Haste,  ye  sprightly  sons  of  pleasure, 
Love  presents  the  fairest  treasure. 
Leave  all  other  joys  for  me. 

A  CHALDEAN  ATTENDANT. 

Or  rather,  love's  delights  despising. 
Haste  to  raptures  ever  rising, 

"Wine  shall  bless  the  brave  and  free. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

"Wine  and  beauty  thus  inviting. 
Each  to  dififerent  joys  exciting, 
Whither  shall  my  choice  incline. 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

I'll  waste  no  longer  thought  in  choosing. 
But,  neither  this  nor  that  refusing, 
I'll  make  them  both  together  mine. 


TEE  CAPTIVITY :    AN  ORATORIO.  229 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

But  whence,  when  joy  should  brighten  o'er  the  bud, 
This  sullen  gloom  in  Judah's  captive  band  ? 
Ye  sons  of  Judah,  why  the  lute  unstrung  ? 
Or  why  those  harps  on  yonder  willows  hung  ? 
Come,  take  the  lyre,  and  pour  the  strain  along  ; 
The  day  demands  it :  sing  us  Sion's  song, 
Dismiss  your  griefs,  and  join  our  warbling  choir, 
For  who  like  you  can  wake  the  sleeping  lyre  ? 

Air. 

Every  moment  as  it  flows, 
Some  peculiar  pleasure  owes. 

Come,  then,  providently  wise, 
Seize  the  debtor  e'er  it  flies. 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

Think  not  to-morrow  can  repay 
The  debt  of  pleasure  lost  to-day 

Alas !  to-morrow's  richest  store 
Can  but  pay  its  proper  score. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

Chain'd  as  we  are,  the  scorn  of  all  mankind, 
To  want,  to  toil,  and  every  ill  consign'd. 
Is  this  a  time  to  bid  us  raise  the  strain. 
Or  mix  in  rites  that  Heaven  regards  with  pain? 
No,  never  !  may  this  hand  forget  each  art 
That  wakes  to  finest  joys  the  human  heart, 
Ere  I  forget  to  land  that  gave  me  birth. 
Or  join  to  sounds  profane  its  sacred  mirth  I 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

Kebellious  slaves !  if  soft  persuasions  fail. 
More  formidable  terrors  shall  prevail. 


230  THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATOBIO. 

FIRST  PROPHET. 

Why,  let  them  come,  one  good  remains  to  cheer— 
"We  fear  the  Lord,  and  scorn  all  other  fear. 

[JSxeunt  Chaldeans. 

CHORUS  OP  ISRAELITES. 

Can  chains  or  tortures  bend  the  mind 

On  God's  supporting  breast  reclined  ? 

Stand  fast,  and  let  our  tyrant  see 

That  fortitude  is  victory.  [Mveunt 


ACT  THE  SECOND. 
Israelites  and  Chaldeans  as  before. 

Air. 
first  prophet. 

O  peace  of  mind,  angelic  guest. 
Thou  soft  companion  of  the  breast, 

Dispense  thy  balmy  store  ! 
"Wing  all  our  thoughts  to  reach  the  skies, 
Till  earth,  receding  from  our  eyes, 

Shall  vanish  as  we  soar  ! 

first  priest. 

No  more.     Too  long  has  justice  been  delay'd, 
The  king's  commands  must  fully  be  obey'd  ; 
Compliance  with  his  will  your  peace  secures, 
Praise  but  our  gods,  and  every  good  is  yours. 
But  if,  rebellious  to  his  high  command. 
You  spurn  the  favors  offer'd  from  his  hand, 


THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO.  231 

Think,  timely  think,  what  terrors  are  behind ; 
Keflect,  nor  tempt  to  rage  the  royal  mind. 

Air. 

Fierce  is  the  tempest  howling 

Along  the  furrow 'd  main, 
And  jBerce  the  whirlwind  rolling 

O'er  Afric's  sandy  plain. 

But  storms  that  fly 

To  rend  the  sky, 
Every  ill  presaging, 

Less  dreadful  show 

To  worlds  below 
Than  angry  monarchs  raging. 

ISRAELITISH  WOMEN. 

Ah  me  !  what  angry  terrors  round  us  grow  ! 
How  shrinks  my  soul  to  meet  the  threaten'd  blow ; 
Ye  prophets,  skill'd  in  Heaven's  eternal  truth, 

Forgive  my  sex's  fears,  forgive  my  youth ! 

Ah  !  let  us  one,  one  little  hour  obey  ; 

To-morrow's  tears  may  wash  the  stain  away. 

Air. 

Fatigued  with  life,  yet  loth  to  part, 

On  hope  the  wretch  relies  ; 
And  every  blow  that  sinks  the  heart 

Bids  the  deluder  rise. 

Hope,  like  the  taper's  gleamy  light, 

Adorns  the  wretch's  way  ; 
And  still,  as  darker  grows  the  night, 

Emits  a  brighter  ray. 


232  THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO. 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

Why  this  delay  ?    At  length  for  joy  prepare. 
I  read  your  looks,  and  see  compliance  there. 
Come  on,  and  bid  the  warbling  r"  pture  rise ; 
Our  monarch's  fame  the  noblest  theme  supplies. 
Begin,. ye  captive  bands,  and  strike  the  lyre  ; 
The  time,  the  theme,  the  place,  and  all  conspire. 

Air. 

CHALDEAN  WOMAN. 

See  the  ruddy  morning  smiling. 
Here  the  grove  to  bliss  beguiling  ; 
Zephyrs  through  the  woodland  playing, 
Streams  along  the  valley  straying. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

While  these  a  constant  revel  keep, 
Shall  reason  only  teach  to  weep  ? 
Hence,  intruder !  we'll  pursue 
Nature,  a  better  guide  than  you. 

SECOND  PRIEST. 

But  bold  !  see,  foremost  of  the  captive  choir. 
The  master  prophet  grasps  his  full-toned  lyre. 
Mark  where  he  sits,  with  executing  art, 
Feels  for  each  tone,  and  speeds  it  to  the  heart. 
See,  how  prophetic  rapture  fills  his  form. 
Awful  as  clouds  that  nurse  the  growing  storm  I 
And  now  his  voice,  accordant  to  the  string. 
Prepares  our  monarch's  victories  to  sing. 


THE  CAPTIVITY:    AN  ORATOBIO.  233 

Air. 

FIRST  PROPHET. 

From  north,  from  south,  from  east,  from  west, 

Conspiring  nations  come : 
Tremble,  thou  vice- polluted  breast! 

Blasphemers,  all  be  dumb. 

The  tempest  gathers  all  around, 

On  Babylon  it  lies  ; 
Down  with  her  !  down,  down  to  the  ground 

She  sinks,  she  groans,  she  dies. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

Down  with  her.  Lord,  to  lick  the  dust. 

Before  yon  setting  sun  ; 
Serve  her  as  she  hath  served  the  just ! 

'Tis  fix'd — it  "shall  be  done. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

'No  more !  when  slaves  thus  insolent  presume, 

The  king  himself  shall  judge  and  fix  their  doom. 

Unthinking  wretches  !  have  not  you  and  all 

Beheld  our  power  in  Zedekiah's  fall  ? 

To  yonder  gloomy  dungeon  turn  your  eyes : 

See  where  dethroned  your  captive  monarch  lies, 

Deprived  of  sight,  and  rankling  in  his  chain  ; 

See  where  he  mourns  his  friends  and  children  slain. 

Yet  know,  ye  slaves,  that  still  remain  behind 

More  ponderous  chains,  and  dungeons  more  confined. 

CHORUS  OF  ALL. 

Arise,  all  potent  ruler,  rise, 

And  vindicate  the  people's  cause, 

Till  every  tongue  in  every  land 
Shall  ofl'er  up  unfeigned  applause. 


234  THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO. 

ACT  THE  THIRD. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

Yes,  my  companions,  Heav^en's  decrees  are  pass'd, 

And  our  fix'd  empire  shall  forever  last : 

In  vain  the  madd'ning  prophet  threatens  woe, 

In  vain  rebellion  aims  her  secret  blow ; 

Still  shall  our  name  and  growing  power  be  spread, 

And  still  our  justice  crush  the  traitor's  head. 

Air. 

Coeval  with  man 
Our  empire  began, 
And  never  shall  fall 
Till  ruin  shakes  all, 
"When  ruin  shakes  all. 
Then  shall  Babylon  fall. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

'Tis  thus  the  proud  triumphant  rear  the  head, — 
A  little  while  and  all  their  power  is  fled. 
But,  ha !  what  means  yon  sadly  plaintive  train, 
That  onward  slowly  bends  along  the  plain  ? 
And  now,  behold,  to  yonder  bank  they  bear 
A  pallid  corse,  and  rest  the  body  there. 
Alas  !  too  well  mine  eyes  indignant  trace 
The  last  remains  of  Judah's  royal  race: 
Fall'n  is  our  king,  and  all  our  fears  are  o'er. 
Unhappy  Zedekiah  is  no  more. 

Air. 

Ye  wretches,  who,  by  fortune's  hate, 

In  want  and  sorrow  groan. 
Come,  ponder  his  severer  fate, 

And  learn  to  bless  your  own. 


TEE  CAPTIVITY :    AN  ORATORIO.  235 

FIRST  PROPHET. 

Te  vain,  whom  youth  and  pleasure  guide, 

Awhile  the  bliss  suspend  ; 
Like  yours,  his  life  began  in  pride, 

Like  his,  your  lives  shall  end. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

Behold  his  wretched  corse  with  sorrow  worn. 
His  squalid  limbs  by  ponderous  fetters  torn  ; 
Those  eyeless  orbs  that  shook  with  ghastly  glare, 
Those  unbecoming  rags,  that  matted  hair  ! 
And  shall  not  Heaven  for  this  avenge  the  foe, 
Grasp  the  red  bolt,  and  lay  the  guilty  low  ? 
How  long,  how  long.  Almighty  God  of  all. 
Shall  wrath  vindictive  threaten  ere  it  fall? 

Air. 

ISRAELITISH  WOMAN. 

As  panting  flies  the  hunted  hind. 

Where  brooks  refreshing  stray ; 
And  rivers  through  the  valley  wind, 

That  stop  the  hunter's  way : 

Thus  we,  O  Lord,  alike  distress'd, 

For  streams  of  mercy  long ; 
Streams  which  cheer  the  sore  oppress'd, 

And  overwhelm  the  strong. 

FIRST  PROPHET, 

But  whence  that  shout?     Good  Heavens  I     Amaze- 
ment all ! 
See  yonder  tower  just  nodding  to  the  fall : 
Behold,  an  army  covers  all  the  ground, 
'Tis  Cyrus  here  that  pours  destruction  round. 


236  THE  CAPTIVITY:    AN  ORATORIO. 

And  now,  behold,  the  battlements  recline — 
o  God  of  hosts,  the  victory  is  thine ! 

CHORUS  OF  CAPTIVES. 

Down  with  them,  Lord,  to  lick  the  dust ; 

Thy  vengeance  be  begun  ; 
Serve  them  as  they  have  served  the  just, 

And  let  thy  will  be  done. 

FIRST  PRIEST. 

All,  all  is  lost !     The  Syrian  army  fails, 
Cyrus,  the  conqueror  of  the  world  prevails. 
The  ruin  smokes,  the  torrent  pours  along — 
How  low  the  proud,  how  feeble  are  the  strong ! 
Save  us,  O  Lord  !  to  Thee,  though  late,  we  pray ; 
And  give  repentance  but  an  hour's  delay. 

Air. 

FIRST  AND  SECOND  PRIESTS. 

O  happy,  who  in  happy  hour 
To  God  their  praise  bestow, 

And  own  his  all-consuming  power 
Before  they  feel  the  blow  ! 

SECOND    PROPHET. 

Kow,  now's  our  time  !  ye  wretches,  bold  and  blind, 

Brave  but  to  God,  and  cowards  to  mankind. 

Ye  seek  in  vain  the  Lord  unsought  before, 

Your  wealth,  your  lives,  your  kingdom,  are  no  more. 

Air. 

O  Lucifer,  thou  son  of  morn. 

Of  Heaven  alike,  and  man  the  foe, — 
Heaven,  men,  and  all, 
Now  press  thy  fall. 
And  sink  the  lowest  of  the  low. 


THE  CAPTIVITY:   AN  ORATORIO.  237 

FIRST  PROPHET. 

Babylon,  how  art  thou  fallen ! 
Thy  fall  more  dreadful  from,  delay  I 

Thy  streets  forlorn, 

To  wilds  shall  turn, 
Where  toads  shall  pant  and  vultures  prey. 

SECOND  PROPHET. 

Such  be  her  fate.     But  hark  !  how  from  afar 
The  clarion's  note  proclaims  the  finish'd  war  I 
Our  great  restorer,  Cyrus,  is  at  hand, 
And  this  way  leads  his  formidable  band. 
Give,  give  your  songs  of  Sion  to  the  wind, 
And  hail  the  benefactor  of  mankind : 
He  comes,  pursuant  to  divine  decree, 
To  chain  the  strong,  and  set  the  captive  free. 

CHORUS  OF  YOUTHS. 

Rise  to  transports  past  expressing. 

Sweeter  by  remember'd  woes  ; 
Cyrus  comes,  our  wrongs  redressing. 

Comes  to  give  the  world  repose. 

CHORUS  OF  VIRGINS. 

Cyrus  comes,  the  world  redressing, 

Love  and  pleasure  in  his  train  ; 
Comes  to  heighten  every  blessing, 

Comes  to  soften  every  pain. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Hail  to  him  with  mercy  reigning, 

Skill'd  in  every  peaceful  art ; 
Who,  from  bonds  our  limbs  unchaining,  . 

Only  binds  the  willing  heart. 


238  EPILOGUE. 

THE  LAST  CHORUS. 


But  chief  to  thee,  our  God,  defender,  friend, 
Let  praise  be  given  to  all  eternity  ; 

O  Thou,  without  beginning,  without  end, 
Let  us,  and  all,  begin  and  end  in  Thee  I 


LINES  ATTKIBUTED  TO  DR.  GOLDSMITH. 

INSERTED  IN  THE  MORNING  CHRONICLE,  OF  APRIL  3,  1800. 

E'en  have  you  seen,  bathed  in  the  morning  dew, 
The  budding  rose  its  infant  bloom  display  ; 

When  first  its  virgin  tints  unfold  to  view. 
It  shrinks,  and  scarcely  trusts  the  blaze  of  day: 

So  soft,  so  delicate,  so  sweet  she  came, 

Youth's  damask  glow  just  dawning  on  her  cheek ; 

I  gazed,  I  sigh'd,  I  caught  the  tender  flame. 
Felt  the  fond  pang,  and  droop'd  with  passion  weak. 


EPILOGUE. 

BY  DR.  GOLDSMITH. 
SPOKEN  BY  MRS.  BULKLEY  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  MISS  HARDCASTLE. 

Well,  having  stoop'd  to  conquer  with  success, 
And  gain'd  a  husband  without  aid  from  dress. 
Still,  as  a  bar-maid,  I  could  wish  it  too, 
As  I  have  conquer'd  him  to  conquer  you : 
And  let  me  say,  for  all  your  resolution, 
That  pretty  bar-maids  have  done  execution. 


EPILOGUE.  239 

Our  life  is  all  a  play,  composed  to  please ; 

"  We  have  our  exits  and  our  entrances." 

The  first  act  shows  the  simple  country  maid, 

Harmless  and  young,  of  everything  afraid  ; 

Blushes  when  hired,  and,  with  unmeaning  action, 

"  I  hopes  as  how  to  give  you  satisfaction." 

Her  second  act  displays  a  livelier  scene, — 

Th'  unblushing  bar-maid  of  a  country  inn, 

"Who  whisks  about  the  house,  at  market  caters, 

Talks  loud,  coquets  the  guests,  and  scolds  the  waiters. 

Next  the  scene  shifts  to  town,  and  there  she  soars, 

The  chop-house  toast  of  ogling  connoisseurs  / 

On  squires  and  cits  she  there  displays  her  arts, 

And  on  the  gridiron  broils  her  lovers'  hearts ; 

And,  as  she  smiles,  her  triumphs  to  complete, 

E'en  common-councilmen  forget  to  eat. 

The  fourth  act  shows  her  wedded  to  the  squire. 

And  madam  now  begins  to  hold  it  higher; 

Pretend  to  taste,  at  opera  cries  caro^ 

And  quits  her  Nancy  Dawson  for  Che  Faro : 

Doats  upon  dancing,  and,  in  all  her  pride. 

Swims  round  the  room,  the  Heinel  of  Cheapside. 

Ogles  and  leers,  with  artificial  skill. 

Till,  having  lost  in  age  the  power  to  kill, 

She  sits  all  night  at  cards,  and  ogles  at  spadille. 

Such,  through  our  lives,  th'  eventful  history  ! 

The  fifth  and  last  act  still  remains  for  me : 

The  bar-maid  now  for  your  protection  prays, 

Turns  female  Barrister,  and  pleads  for  Bays. 


240  EPILOGUE. 


EPILOGUE* 

TO  BE  SPOKEN  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  TONY  LUMPKIN, 
BY  J.  CKADOCK,  ESQ. 

Well,  now  all's  ended,  and  my  comrades  gone, 
Pray  what  becomes  of  mother's  nonly  son  ? 
A  hopeful  blade  ! — in  town  I'll  fix  my  station, 
And  try  to  make  a  bluster  in  the  nation  : 
As  for  my  cousin  Neville,  I  renounce  her — 
Off,  in  a  crack,  I'll  carry  big  Bet  Bouncer. 

Why  should  not  I  in  the  great  world  appear  ? 
I  soon  shall  have  a  thousand  pounds  a  year  ! 
No  matter  what  a  man  may  here  inherit, 
In  London — gad,  they've  some  regard  to  spirit. 
I  see  the  horses  prancing  up  the  streets. 
And  big  Bet  Bouncer  bobs  to  all  she  meets ; 
Then  hoiks  to  jigs  and  pastimes  every  night — 
Not  to  the  plays — they  say  it  ain't  polite : 
To  Sadler's  Wells,  perhaps,  or  operas  go, 
And  once,  by  chance,  to  the  roratorio. 
Thus,  here  and  there,  forever  up  and  down  ; 
We'll  set  the  fashions,  too,  to  half  the  town ; 
And  then  at  auctions — money  ne'er  regard — 
Buy  pictures,  like  the  great,  ten  pounds  a-yard : 
Zounds !  we  shall  make  these  London  gentry  say. 
We  know  what's  damn'd  genteel  as  well  as  they  I 

*This  came  too  late  to  be  spoken. 


COMMENDATORY  VERSES.  241 


7EKSES 

ON    THE 

DEATH  OF  DR.  GOLDSMITH. 


EXTRACT  FROM  A  POEM 

WRITTEN  BY  COURTNEY  MELMOTH,  ESQ. 

ON  THE   DEATH   OF  EMINENT  ENGLISH   POETS. 

THE  TEARS  OF  GENIUS, 

The  village  bell  tolls  out  the  note  of  death, 
And  through  the  echoing  air  the  length'ning  sound, 
With  dreadful  pause,  reverberating  deep. 
Spreads  the  sad  tidings  o'er  fair  Auburn's  vale. 
There,  to  enjoy  the  scenes  her  bard  had  praised 
In  all  the  sweet  simplicity  of  song. 
Genius,  in  pilgrim  garb,  sequester'd  sat, 
And  herded  jocund  with  the  harmless  swains ; 
But  when  she  heard  the  fate-foreboding  knell, 
"With  startled  step,  precipitate  and  swift, 
And  look  pathetic,  full  of  dire  presage, 
The  church-way  walk  beside  the  neighb'ring  green, 
Sorrowing  she  sought ;  and  there,  in  black  array, 
Borne  on  the  shoulders  of  the  swains  he  loved, 
She  saw  the  boast  of  Auburn  moved  along. 
Touch'd  at  the  view,  her  pensive  breast  she  struck, 
And  to  the  cypress,  which  incumbent  hangs. 
With  leaning  slope  and  branch  irregular, 
O'er  the  moss'd  pillars  of  the  sacred  fane. 


242  COMMENDATORY  VERSES. 

The  briar-bound  grave  shadowing  with  funeral  gloom, 
Forlorn  she  hied  ;  and  there  the  crowding  woe 
(Swell'd  by  the  parent)  press'd  on  bleeding  thought, 
Big  ran  the  drops  from  her  maternal  eye, 
Fast  broke  the  bosom-sorrow  from  her  heart, 
And  pale  Distress  sat  sickly  on  her  cheek. 
As  thus  her  plaintive  Elegy  began  : — 

"  And  must  my  children  all  expire  ? 

Shall  none  be  left  to  strike  the  lyre  ? 

Courts  Death  alone  a  learned  prize  ? 

Falls  his  shafts  only  on  the  wise  ? 

Can  no  fit  marks  on  earth  be  found, 

From  useless  thousands  swarming  round  ? 

"What  crowding  ciphers  cram  the  land, 

What  hosts  of  victims,  at  command ! 

Yet  shall  the  ingenious  drop  alone  ? 

Shall  Science  grace  the  tyrant's  throne  ? 

Thou  murd'rer  of  the  tuneful  train 

I  charge  thee  with  my  children  slain  ! 
Scarce  has  the  sun  thrice  urged  his  annual  tour, 
Since  half  my  race  have  felt  thy  barbarous  power 

Sore  hast  thou  thinn'd  each  pleasing  art, 

And  struck  a  muse  with  every  dart ; 
Bard  after  bard  obey'd  thy  slaughtering  call, 
Till  scarce  a  poet  lives  to  sing  a  brother's  fall. 

Then  let  a  widow'd  mother  pay 

The  tribute  of  a  parting  lay ; 
Tearful,  inscribe  the  monumental  strain. 
And  speak  aloud  her  feelings  and  her  pain  ! 
"  And  first,  farewell  to  thee,  my  son,"  she  cried, 

"  And  first,  farewell  to  thee,  my  son,"  she  cried, 
Long  for  thy  sake  the  peasant's  tear  shall  flow. 
And  many  a  virgin  bosom  heave  with  woe ; 


COMMENDATORY  VERSES.  243 

For  thee  shall  sorrow  sadden  all  the  scene, 

And  every  pastime  perish  on  the  green  ; 

The  sturdy  farmer  shall  suspend  his  tale, 

The  woodman's  ballad  shall  no  more  regale, 

No  more  shall  Mirth  each  rustic  sport  inspire, 

But  every  frolic,  every  feat,  shall  tire. 

No  more  the  evening  gambol  shall  delight, 

Nor  moonshine-revels  crown  the  vacant  night ; 

But  groups  of  villagers  (each  joy  forgot) 

Shall  form  a  sad  assembly  round  the  cot. 

Sweet  bard,  farewell ! — and  farewell,  Auburn's  bliss, 

The  bashful  lover,  and  the  yielded  kiss : 

The  evening  warble  Philomela  made. 

The  echoing  forest,  and  the  whispering  shade. 

The  winding  brook,  the  bleat  of  brute  content. 

And  the  blithe  voice  that  "  whistled  as  it  went :  " 

These  shall  no  longer  charm  the  ploughman's  care. 

But  sighs  shall  fill  the  pauses  of  despair. 

"  Goldsmith,   adieu  ;    the   '  book-learn'd  priest '  for 
thee 
Shall  now  in  vain  possess  his  festive  glee, 
The  oft-heard  jest  in  vain  he  shall  reveal. 
For  now,  alas !  the  jest  he  cannot  feel. 
But  ruddy  damsels  o'er  thy  tomb  shall  bend. 
And  conscious  weep  for  their  and  virtue's  friend  ; 
The  milkmaid  shall  reject  the  shepherd's  song, 
And  cease  to  carol  as  she  toils  along  : 
All  Auburn  shall  bewail  the  fatal  day, 
"When  from  her  fields  their  pride  was  snatch'd  away. 
And  even  the  matron  of  the  cressy  lake, 
In  piteous  plight,  her  palsied  head  shall  shake, 
"While  all  adown  the  furrows  of  her  face 
Slow  shall  the  lingering  tears  each  other  trace. 

22— G  &  G— K 


244  COMMENDATORY  VERSES. 

"  And,  ohj  my  child  !  severer  woes  remain 
To  all  the  houseless  and  unshelter'd  train ! 
Thy  fate  shall  sadden  many  an  humble  guest, 
And  heap  fresh  anguish  on  the  beggar's  breast ; 
For  dear  wert  thou  to  all  the  sons  of  pain, 
To  all  that  wander,  sorrow  or  complain  : 
Dear  to  the  learned,  to  the  simple  dear, 
For  daily  blessing  mark'd  thy  virtuous  year. 
The  rich  received  a  moral  from  thy  head. 
And  from  thy  heart  the  stranger  found  a. bed  ; 
Distress  came  always  smiling  from  thy  door  ; 
For  God  had  made  thee  agent  to  the  poor, 
Had  form'd  thy  feelings  on  the  noblest  plan, 
To  grace  at  once  the  poet  and  the  man." 


EXTRACT  FROM  A  MONODY. 

Daek  as  the  night,  which  now  in  dunnest  robe 

Ascends  her  zenith  o'er  the  silent  globe, 

Sad  Melancholy  wakes,  a  while  to  tread, 

With  solemn  step,  the  mansions  of  the  dead  : 

Led  by  her  hand,  o'er  this  yet  recent  shrine 

I  sorrowing  bend  ;  and  here  essay  to  twine 

The  tributary  wreath  of  laureate  bloom, 

With  artless  hands,  to  deck  a  poet's  tomb, — 

The    tomb    where    Goldsmith    sleeps.     Fond    hopes, 

adieu, 
No  more  your  airy  dreams  shall  mock  my  view ; 
Here  will  I  learn  ambition  to  control. 
And  each  aspiring  passion  of  the  soul : 
E'en  now,  methinks,  his  well-known  voice  I  hear, 


COMMENDATORY  VERSES.  245 

"When  late  he  meditated  flight  from  care, 

When,  as  imagination  fondly  hied 

To  scenes  of  sweet  retirement,  thus  he  cried : — 

"  Ye  splendid  fabrics,  palaces,  and  towers, 
"Where  dissipation  leads  the  giddy  hours, 
"Where  pomp,  disease,  and  knavery  reside 
And  folly  bends  the  knee  to  wealthy  pride ; 
Where  luxury's  purveyors  learn  to  rise. 
And  worth,  to  want  a  prey,  unfriended  dies; 
Where  warbling  eunuchs  glitter  in  brocade, 
And  hapless  poets  toil  for  scanty  bread  : 
Farewell !  to  other  scenes  I  turn  my  eyes, 
Embosom'd  in  the  vale  where  Auburn  lies — 
Deserted  Auburn,  those  now  ruin'd  glades. 
Forlorn,  yet  ever  dear  and  honor'd  shades, 
There,  though  the  hamlet  boasts  no  smiling  train, 
Nor  sportful  pastime  circling  on  the  plain, 
No  needy  villains  prowl  around  for  prey, 
No  slanderers,  no  sycophants  betray  ; 
No  gaudy  foplings  scornfully  deride 
The  swain,  whose  humble  pipe  is  all  his  pride, — 
There  will  I  fly  to  seek  that  soft  repose. 
Which  solitude  contemplative  bestows. 
Yet,  oh,  fond  hope !  perchance  there  still  remains 
One  lingering  friend  behind,  to  bless  the  plains ; 
Some  hermit  of  the  dale,  enshrined  in  ease. 
Long  lost  companion  of  my  youthful  days  ; 
With  whose  sweet  converse  in  his  social  bower, 
I  oft  may  chide  away  some  vacant  hour ; 
To  whose  pure  sympathy  I  may  impart 
Each  latent  grief  that  labors  at  my  heart, 
Whate'er  I  felt,  and  what  I  saw,  relate, 
The  shoals  of  luxury,  the  wrecks  of  state, — 


246  COMMENDATORY  VERSES. 

Those  busy  scenes,  where  science  wakes  in  vain, 
In  which  I  shared,  ah !  ne'er  to  share  again. 
But  whence  that  pang  ?  does  nature  now  rebel  ? 
Why  falters  out  my  tongue  the  Avord  farewell  ? 
Ye  friends !  who  long  have  witness'd  to  my  toil, 
And  seen  me  ploughing  in  a  thankless  soil, 
Whose  partial  tenderness  hush'd  every  pain. 
Whose  approbation  made  my  bosom  vain, — 
'Tis  you  to  whom  my  soul  divided  hies 
With  fond  regret,  and  half  unwilling  flies ; 
Sighs  forth  her  parting  Avishes  to  the  wind, 
And  lingering  leaves  her  better  half  behind. 
Can  I  forget  the  intercourse  I  shared. 
What  friendship  cherish'd,  and  what  zeal  endear'd  ? 
Alas !  remembrance  still  must  turn  to  you. 
And,  to  my  latest  hour,  protract  the  long  adieu. 
Amid  the  woodlands,  wheresoe'er  I  rove, 
The  plain,  or  secret  cover  of  the  grove, 
Imagination  shall  supply  her  store 
Of  painful  bliss,  and  what  she  can  restore ; 
Shall  strew  each  lonely  path  with  fiow'rets  gay, 
And  wide  as  is  her  boundless  empire  stray ; 
On  eagle  pinions  traverse  earth  and  skies. 
And  bid  the  lost  and  distant  objects  rise. 
Here,  where  encircled  o'er  the  sloping  land 
Woods  rise  on  woods,  shall  Aristotle  stand ; 
Lyceum  round  the  godlike  man  rejoice, 
And  bow  with  reverence  to  wisdom's  voice. 
There,  spreading  oaks  shall  arch  the  vaulted  dome, 
The  champion,  there,  of  liberty  and  Rome, 
In  Attic  eloquence  shall  thunder  laws. 
And  uncorrupted  senates  shout  applause. 
Not  more  ecstatic  visions  rapt  the  soul  i 


COMMENDATORY  VERSES.  247 

Of  Numa,  when  to  midnight  grots  he  stole, 

And  learnt  his  lore,  from  virtue's  mouth  refined. 

To  fetter  vice,  and  harmonize  mankind. 

Now  stretch'd  at  ease  beside  some  fav'rite  stream 

Of  beauty  and  enchantment  will  I  dream ; 

Elysium,  seats  of  arts,  and  laurels  won. 

The  Graces  three,  Japhet's  ^  fabled  son  ; 

"Whilst  Angelo  shall  wave  the  mystic  rod, 

And  see  a  new  creation  wait  his  nod ; 

Prescribe  his  bounds  to  Time's  remorseless  power, 

And  to  my  arms  my  absent  friends  restore ; 

Place  me  amidst  the  group,  each  well  known  face, 

The  sons  of  science,  lords  of  human  race ; 

And  as  oblivion  sinks  at  his  command. 

Nature  shall  rise  more  finish'd  from  his  hand. 

Thus  some  magician,  fraught  with  potent  skill. 

Transforms  and  moulds  each  varied  mass  at  will ; 

Calls  animated  forms  of  wondrous  birth, 

Cadmean  offspring,  from  the  teeming  earth, 

Unceres  the  ponderous  tombs,  the  realms  of  night, 

And  calls  their  cold  inhabitants  to  light ; 

Or,  as  he  traverses  a  dreary  scene. 

Bids  every  sweet  of  nature  there  convene. 

Huge  mountains  skirted  round  with  wavy  woods, 

The  shrub-deck'd  lawns,  and  silver-sprinkled  floods. 

"Whilst  flow'rets  spring  around  the  smiling  land. 

And  follow  on  the  traces  of  his  wand. 

"  Such  prospects,  lovely  Auburn !  then,  be  thine, 
And  what  thou  canst  of  bliss  impart  be  mine ; 
Amid  thy  humble  shades,  in  tranquil  ease, 
Grant  me  to  pass  the  remnant  of  my  days. 
Dnfetter'd  from  the  toil  of  wretched  gain, 

*  Promethevis. 


248  COMMENDATORY  VJEBSES. 

My  raptured  muse  shall  pour  her  noblest  strain, 
Within  her  native  bowers  the  notes  prolong, 
And,  grateful,  meditate  her  latest  song. 
Thus,  as  adovvn  the  slope  of  life  I  bend. 
And  move,  resign'd,  to  meet  my  latter  end. 
Each  worldly  wish,  each  worldly  care  repress'd 
A  self-approving  heart  alone  possess'd, 
Content,  to  bounteous  Heaven  I'll  leave  the  rest." 

Thus  spoke  the  bard :  but  not  one  friendly  power 
With  nod  assentive  crown'd  the  parting  hour ; 
No  eastern  meteor  glared  beneath  the  sky. 
No  dextral  omen :  Nature  heaved  a  sigh 
Prophetic  of  the  dire,  impending  blow, 
The  presage  of  her  loss,  and  Britain's  woe. 
Already  portion'd,  unrelenting  fate 
Had  made  a  pause  upon  the  number'd  date ; 
Behind  stood  Death,  too  horrible  for  sight. 
In  darkness  clad,  expectant,  pruned  for  flight ; 
Pleased  at  the  word,  the  shapeless  monster  sped. 
On  eager  message  to  the  humble  shed. 
Where,  wrapt  by  soft  poetic  visions  round. 
Sweet  slumbering,  Fancy's  darling  son  he  found. 
At  his  approach  the  silken  pinion'd  train, 
Affrighted,  mount  aloft,  and  quit  the  brain. 
Which  late  they  fann'd.     Now  other  scenes  than  dales 
Of  woody  pride,  succeed,  or  flowery  vales  : 
As  when  a  sudden  tempest  veils  the  sky. 
Before  serene,  and  streaming  lightnings  fly, 
The  prospect  shifts,  and  pitchy  volumes  roll 
Along  the  drear  expanse,  from  pole  to  pole ; 
Terrific  horrors  all  the  void  invest. 
Whilst  the  arch  spectre  issues  forth  confest. 
The  Bard  beholds  him  beckon  to  the  tomb 


COMMENDATORY  VERSES.  249 

Of  yawning  night,  eternity's  dread  womb  ; 
In  vain  attempts  to  fly,  th'  impassive  air 
Ketards  his  steps,  and  yields  him  to  despair  ; 
He  feels  a  gripe  that  thrills  through  every  vein, 
And  panting  struggles  in  the  fatal  chain. 
Here  paused  the  fell  destroyer,  to  survey 
The  pride,  the  boast  of  man,  his  destined  prey ; 
Prepared  to  strike,  he  pois'd  aloft  the  dart, 
And  plunged  the  steel  in  Virtue's  bleeding  heart ; 
Abhorrent,  back  the  springs  of  life  rebound, 
And  leave  on  Nature's  face  a  ghastly  wound, 
A  wound  enroU'd  among  Britannia's  woes, 
That  ages  yet  to  follow  cannot  close. 

O  Goldsmith  !  how  shall  Sorrow  now  essay 
To  murmur  out  her  slow,  incondite  lay  ? 
In  what  sad  accents  mourn  the  luckless  hour, 
That  yielded  thee  to  unrelenting  power  ; 
Thee,  the  proud  boast  of  all  the  tuneful  train 
That  sweep  the  lyre,  or  swell  the  polish'd  strain? 
Much  honored  Bard  !  if  my  ututor'd  verse 
Could  pay  a  tribute  worthy  of  thy  hearse. 
With  fearless  hands  I'd  build  the  fane  of  praise. 
And  boldly  strew  the  never-fading  bays. 
But,  ah  !  with  thee  my  guardian  genius  fled. 
And  pillow'd  in  thy  tomb  his  silent  head : 
Pain'd  Memory  alone  behind  remains, 
And  pensive  stalks  the  solitary  plains. 
Rich  in  her  sorrows ;  honors  without  art 
She  pays  in  tears  redundant  from  the  heart. 
And  say,  what  boots  it  o'er  tliy  hallow' d  dust 
To  heap  the  graven  pile,  or  laurell'd  bust ; 
Since  by  tliy  hands,  already  raised  on  high, 
We  see  a  fabric  tow'ring  to  the  sky  ; 


250  COMMENDATORY  VERSES. 

"Where,  hand  in  hand  with  Time,  the  sacred  lore 
Shall  travel  on,  till  Nature  is  no  more  ? 


LINES  BY  W.  WOTTY. 

Adieu,  sweet  Bard !  to  each  fine  feeling  true, 

Thy  virtues  many,  and  thy  foibles  few, — 

These  form'd  to  charm  e'en  vicious  minds,  and  these 

"With  harmless  mirth  the  social  soul  to  please. 

Another's  woe  thy  heart  could  always  melt ; 

None  gave  more  free,  for  none  more  deeply  felt. 

Sweet  Bard,  adieu  !  thy  own  harmonious  lays 

Have  sculptured  out  thy  monument  of  praise. 

Yes,  these  survive  to  Time's  remotest  day ; 

"While  drops  the  bust,  and  boastful  tombs  decay. 

Reader,  if  number'd  in  the  Muse's  train. 

Go,  tune  the  lyre,  and  imitate  his  strain ; 

But,  if  no  poet  thou,  reverse  the  plan, 

Depart  in  peace,  and  imitate  the  man. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER 5 

OR, 
THE  MISTAKES  OF  A  NIGHT. 

A   COMEDY. 

She  stoops  to  Conquer  was  represented  for  the  first  time,  March 
15,  1773.  It  was  very  successful,  and  became  a  stock  play. 
Goldsmith  originally  entitled  it.  The  Old  House  a  New  Inn. 


DEDICATION. 

TO    SAMUEL    JOHNSON,  LL.D. 

Dear  Sir, — By  inscribing  this  slight  performance  to 
you,  I  do  not  mean  so  much  to  compliment  you  as  my- 
self. It  may  do  me  some  honor  to  inform  the  public 
that  I  have  lived  many  years  in  intimacy  with  you. 
It  may  serve  the  interests  of  mankind  also  to  inform 
them  that  the  greatest  wit  may  be  found  in  a  char- 
acter, without  impairing  the  most  unaffected  piety. 

I  have,  particularly,  reason  to  thank  you  for  your 
partiality  to  this  performance.  The  undertaking  a 
comedy,  not  merely  sentimental,  was  very  dangerous ; 
and  Mr.  Colman,  who  saw  this  piece  in  its  various 
stages,  always  thought  it  so.  However,  I  ventured  to 
trust  it  to  the  public  ;  and  though  it  was  necessarily 
delayed  till  late  in  the  season,  1  have  every  reason  to 
be  grateful. 

I  am,  dear  Sir, 
Your  most  sincere  friend  and  admirer, 

OLIVER  GOLDSMITH. 
251 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEIi. 


DRAMATIS  PERSONS. 

MEN. 

Sir  Charles  Marlow. 

Young  Marlow  {his  son), 

Hardcastle. 

Hastings. 

Tony  Lurajglcin. 

Diggory. 

WOMEN. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle. 
Miss  Hardcastle, 
Miss  Neville. 
Maid. 

Landlord,  Servants,  etG> 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER  ; 

OR, 

~       THE  MISTAKES  OF  A  NIGHT. 


•'     PROLOGUE. 

BY  DAVID  GAKRICK,  ESQ. 

JEnter  Mr.  Woodward,  dressed  in  hlach,  and  holding  a 
handkerchief  to  his  eyes. 

Excuse  me,  sirs,  I  pray, — I  can't  yet  speak, — 

I'm  crying  now, — and  have  been  all  the  week. 

"  'Tis  not  alone  this  mourning  suit,"  good  masters  ; 

"  I've  that  within,"  for  which  there  are  no  plasters  ! 

Pray,  would  you  know  the  reason  why  I'm  crying  ? 

The  Comic  Muse,  long  sick,  is  now  a-dying  ! 

And  if  she  goes,  my  tears  will  never  stop ; 

For,  as  a  player,  I  can't  squeeze  out  one  drop  ; 

I  am  undone,  that's  all, — shall  lose  my  bread, — 

I'd  rather, — but  that's  nothing, — lose  my  head. 

When  the  sweet  maid  is  laid  upon  the  bier, 

Shuter  and  I  shall  be  chief  mourners  here. 

To  her  a  mawkish  drab  of  spurious  breed, 

Who  deals  in  sentimentals,  will  succeed. 

Poor  Ned  and  I  are  dead  to  all  intents  ; 

We  can  as  soon  speak  Greek  as  sentiments. 

253 


254  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Both  nervous  grown,  to  keep  our  spirits  up, 

"We  now  and  then  take  down  a  hearty  cup. 

"What  shall  we  do  ?     If  Comedy  forsake  us. 

They'll  turn  us  out,  and  no  one  else  will  take  us. 

But  why  can't  I  be  moral  ?     Let  me  try  : 

My  heart  thus  pressing — fix'd  my  face  and  eye — 

"With  a  sententious  look  that  nothing  means 

(Faces  are  blocks  in  sentimental  scenes). 

Thus  1  begin,  "  All  is  not  gold  that  glitters, 

Pleasures  seem  sweet,  but  prove  a  glass  of  bitters. 

"When  ign'rance  enters,  folly  is  at  hand  : 

Learning  is  better  far  than  house  or  land. 

Let  not  your  virtue  trip  :  who  trips  may  stumble, 

And  virtue  is  not  virtue  if  she  tumble." 

I  give  it  up — morals  won't  do  for  me  ; 

To  make  you  laugh,  I  must  play  tragedy. 

One  hope  remains, — hearing  the  maid  was  ill, 

A  Doctor  comes  this  night  to  show  his  skill ; 

To  cheer  her  heart,  and  give  your  muscles  motion. 

He,  in  Five  Draughts  prepared,  presents  a  potion, 

A  kind  of  magic  charm  ;  for,  be  assured. 

If  you  will  swallow  it,  the  maid  is  cured : 

But  desperate  the  Doctor's  and  her  case  is, 

If  you  reject  the  dose  and  make  wry  faces. 

This  truth  he  boasts,  will  boast  it  while  he  lives, 

No  pois'nous  drugs  are  mixed  in  what  he  gives. 

Should  he  succeed,  you'll  give  him  his  degree ; 

If  not,  within  he  will  receive  no  fee. 

The  college,  you,  must  his  pretensions  back, 

Pronounce  him  Regular,  or  dub  him  Quack. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  255 

ACT  FIRST. 
Scene  I.— a  chamber  in  an  old-fashioned  house. 
Enter  Mrs.  Hardcastle  and  Mr.  Ha/rdcastle. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  I  vow,  Mr.  Hardcastle,  you're 
very  particular.  Is  there  a  creature  in  the  whole  coun- 
try but  ourselves,  that  does  not  take  a  trip  to  town 
now  and  then,  to  rub  off  the  rust  a  little  ?  There's  the 
two  Miss  Hoggs,  and  our  neighbor  Mrs.  Grigsby,  go 
to  take  a  month's  polishing  every  winter. 

Hardcastle.  Aj,  and  bring  back  vanity  and  affecta- 
tion to  last  them  the  whole  year.  I  wonder  why  Lon- 
don cannot  keep  its  own  fools  at  home.  In  my  time, 
the  follies  of  the  town  crept  slowly  among  us,  but  now 
they  travel  faster  than  a  stage  coach.  Its  fopperies 
come  down  not  only  as  inside  passengers,  but  in  the 
very  basket. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Ay,  your  times  were  fine  times 
indeed :  you  have  been  telling  us  of  them  for  many  a 
long  year.  Here  we  live  in  an  old  rumbling  mansion, 
that  looks  for  all  the  world  like  an  inn,  but  that  we 
never  see  company.  Our  best  visitors  are  old  Mrs. 
Oddfish,  the  curate's  wife,  and  little  Cripplegate,  the 
lame  dancing  master ;  and  all  our  entertainment  your 
old  stories  of  Prince  Eugene  and  the  Duke  of  Marl- 
borough.    I  hate  such  old-fashioned  trumpery. 

Hardcastle.  And  I  love  it.  I  love  everything  that's 
old  :  old  friends,  old  times,  old  manners,  old  books,  old 
wine ;  and,  I  believe,  Dorothy,  {taking  her  hand,)  you'll 
own,  I've  been  pretty  fond  of  an  old  wife. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     Lord,  Mr.  Hardcastle,  you're  for- 


256  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

ever  at  your  Dorothys,  and  your  old  wives.  You  may 
be  a  Darby,  but  I'll  be  no  Joan,  I  promise  you,  I'm 
not  so  old  as  you'd  make  me,  by  more  than  one  good 
year.     Add  twenty  to  twenty  and  make  money  of  that. 

Hardcastle.  Let  me  see ;  twenty  added  to  twenty, 
makes  just  fifty  and  seven. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  It's  false,  Mr.  Hardcastle  ;  I  was 
but  twenty  when  I  was  brought  to-bed  of  Tony,  that  I 
had  by  Mr.  Lumpkin,  my  first  husband  ;  and  he's  not 
come  to  years  of  discretion  yet. 

Hardcastle.  Nor  ever  will,  I  dare  answer  for  him. 
Ay,  you  have  taught  him  finely. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  No  matter.  Tony  Lumpkin  has 
a  good  fortune.  My  son  is  not  to  live  by  his  learning. 
I  don't  think  a  bo}'"  wants  much  learning  to  spend  fif- 
teen hundred  a-year. 

Hardcastle.  Learning,  quotha  !  a  mere  composition 
of  tricks  and  mischief. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Humor,  my  dear,  nothing  but 
humor.  Come,  Mr.  Hardcastle,  you  must  allow  the 
boy  a  little  humor. 

Hardcastle.  I'd  sooner  allow  him  a  horse-pond.  If 
burning  the  footman's  shoes,  frightening  the  maids, 
and  worrying  the  kittens,  be  humor,  he  has  it.  It  was 
but  yesterday  he  fastened  my  wig  to  the  back  of  my 
chair,  and  when  I  went  to  make  a  bow,  I  popt  my 
bald  head  in  Mrs.  Frizzle's  face. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  And  I  am  to  blame  %  The  poor 
boy  was  always  too  sickly  to  do  any  good.  A  school 
would  be  his  death.  When  he  comes  to  be  a  little 
stronger,  who  knows  what  a  year  or  two's  Latin  may 
do  for  him  ? 

Hardcastle.     Latin  for  him  !  A  cat  and  fiddle.     No, 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  257 

no ;  the  alehouse  and  the  stable  are  the  only  school 
he'll  ever  go  to. 

Mrs.  Rardcastle.  Well,  we  must  not  snub  the  poor 
boy  now,  for  1  believe  we  shan't  have  him  long  among 
us.  Anybody  that  looks  in  his  face  may  see  he's  con- 
sumptive. 

Hardcastle.  Ay,  if  growing  too  fat  be  one  of  the 
symptoms. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     He  coughs  sometimes. 

Hardcastle.  Yes,  when  his  liquor  goes  the  wrong 
way. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     I'm  actually  afraid  of  his  lungs. 

Hardcastle.  And  truly  so  am  I ;  for  he  sometimes 
whoops  like  a  speaking  trumpet — {Tony  hallooing  he- 
hind  the  scenes.) — Oh,  there  he  goes — a  very  consump- 
tive figure,  truly ! 

Enter  Tony,  crossing  the  stage. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Tony,  where  are  you  going,  my 
charmer  ?  Won't  you  give  papa  and  I  a  little  of  your 
company,  lovey  ? 

Tony.     I'm  in  haste,  mother ;  I  cannot  stay. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  You  shan't  venture  out  this  raw 
evening,  my  dear  ;  you  look  most  shockingly. 

Tony.  I  can't  stay,  I  tell  you.  The  Three  Pigeons 
expects  me  down  every  moment.  There's  some  fun 
going  forward. 

Hardcastle.  Ay,  the  alehouse,  the  old  place ;  I 
thought  so. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     A  low,  paltry  set  of  fellows. 

Tony.  Not  so  low  neither.  There's  Dick  Muggins, 
the  exciseman,   Jack   Slang,   the  horse-doctor,  little 


258  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Aminadab,  that  grinds  the  music-box,  and  Tom  Twist, 
that  spins  the  pewter  platter. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Pray,  my  dear,  disappoint  them 
for  one  night  at  least. 

Tony.  As  for  disappointing  them,  I  should  not  so 
much  mind  ;  but  I  can't  abide  to  disappoint  myself. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     {Detaining  him.)    You  shan't  go. 

Tony.     1  will,  I  tell  you. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     I  say  you  shan't. 

Tony.     We'll  see  which  is  the  strongest,  you  or  T. 

[Axit,  hauling  her  out. 

Hardcastle.  {Alone.)  Ay,  there  goes  a  pair  that 
only  spoil  each  other.  But  is  not  the  whole  age  in 
combination  to  drive  sense  and  discretion  out  of  doors  ? 
There's  my  pretty  darling,  Kate !  the  fashions  of  the 
times  have  almost  infected  her  too.  By  living  a  year 
or  two  in  town,  she  is  as  fond  of  gauze  and  French 
frippery  as  the  best  of  them. 

Enter  Miss  Hardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  Blessings  on  my  pretty  innocence ! 
drest  out  as  usual,  my  Kate.  Goodness!  what  a  quan- 
tity of  superfluous  silk  hast  thou  got  about  thee,  girl ! 
I  could  never  teach  the  fools  of  this  age,  that  the  indi- 
gent world  could  be  clothed  out  of  the  trimmings  of 
the  vain. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  You  know  our  agreement,  sir. 
You  allow  me  the  morning  to  receive  and  pay  visits, 
and  to  dress  in  my  own  manner ;  and  in  the  evening  I 
put  on  my  housewife's  dress  to  please  you. 

Hardcastle.  Well,  remember  I  insist  on  the  terms 
of  our  agreement,  and,  by-the-bye,  I  believe  I  shall  havQ 
4^  occasion  to  try  your  obedience  this  very  evening. 


^ 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  259 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  protest,  sir,  1  don't  comprehend 
your  meaning. 

Hardcastle.  Then,  to  be  plain  with  you,  Kate,  I  ex- 
pect the  young  gentleman  1  have  chosen  to  be  your 
husband  from  town  this  very  day.  I  have  his  father's 
letter,  in  which  he  informs  me  his  son  is  set  out,  and 
that  he  intends  to  follow  him  shortly  after. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Indeed !  I  wish  I  had  known 
something  of  this  before.  Bless  me,  how  shall  I  be- 
have. It's  a  thousand  to  one  1  shan't  like  him  ;  our 
meeting  will  be  so  formal  and  so  like  a  thing  of 
business,  that  I  shall  find  no  room  for  friendship  or 
esteem. 

Hardcastle.  Depend  upon  it,  child,  I  never  will  con- 
trol your  choice  ;  but  Mr.  Mario w,  whom  I  have  pitched 
upon,  is  the  son  of  my  old  friend,  Sir  Charles  Mario w, 
of  whom  you  have  heard  me  talk  so  often.  The  young 
gentleman  has  been  bred  a  scholar,  and  is  designed  for 
an  employment  in  the  service  of  his  country.  I  am 
told  he's  a  man  of  an  excellent  understanding. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Is  he  % 

Hardcastle.     Very  generous. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     I  believe  I  shall  like  him. 

Hardcastle.     Young  and  brave. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     I'm  sure  I  shall  like  him. 

Hardcastle.     And  verv  handsome. 

Miss  Hardcastlcs,  My  dear  papa,  say  no  more, 
{kissing  his  hand  )  he's  mine — I'll  have  him. 

Hardcastle.  And,  to  crown  all,  Kate,  he's  one  of 
the  most  bashful  and  reserved  young  fellows  in  all  the 
world. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Eh  !  you  have  frozen  me  to  death 
again.     That  word  reserved  has  undone  all  the  rest  of 


260  BHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

his  accomplishments.  A  reserv^ed  lover,  it  is  said,  at 
ways  makes  a  suspicious  husband. 

Hardcastle.  On  the  contrary,  modesty  seldom  re- 
sides in  a  breast  that  is  not  enriched  with  nobler  vir- 
tues. It  was  the  very  feature  in  his  character  that 
first  struck  me. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  He  must  have  more  striking  fea- 
tures to  catch  me,  I  promise  you.  However,  if  he  be 
so  young,  so  handsome,  and  so  everything  as  you  men- 
tion, I  believe  he'll  do  still.     I  think  I'll  have  him. 

Hardcastle.  Ay,  Kate,  but  there  is  still  an  obstacle. 
It's  more  than  an  even  wager  he  may  not  have  you. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  My  dear  papa,  why  will  you  mor- 
tify one  so  ?  Well,  if  he  refuses,  instead  of  breaking 
m}'^  heart  at  his  indifference,  I'll  only  break  my  glass 
for  its  flattery,  set  my  cap  to  some  newer  fashion,  and 
look  out  for  some  less  difficult  admirer. 

Hardcastle.  Bravely  resolved  I  In  the  mean  time, 
I'll  go  prepare  the  servants  for  his  reception  :  as  we 
seldom  see  company,  they  want  as  much  training  as  a 
company  of  recruits  the  first  day's  muster.  \_Exit. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {Alone.)  Lud,  this  news  of  papa's 
puts  me  all  in  a  flutter.  Young,  handsome  ;  these  he 
put  last,  but  I  put  them  foremost.  Sensible,  good-na- 
tured ;  I  like  all  that.  But  then,  reserved  and  sheep- 
ish ;  that's  much  against  him.  Yet  can't  he  be  cured 
of  his  timidity  by  being  taught  to  be  proud  of  his  wife? 
Yes  ;  and  can't  I — but  I  vow  I'm  disposing  of  the  hus- 
band, before  I  have  secured  the  lover. 

Enter  Miss  Neville. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I'm  glad  you're  come,  Neville, 
my  dear.     Tell  me,  Constance,  how  do  I  look  this  even- 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  261 

ing  ?  Is  there  anything  whimsical  about  me  ?  Is  it 
one  of  my  well-looking  days,  child  ?  Am  I  in  face  to- 
day ? 

Miss  Neville.  Perfectly,  my  dear.  Yet  now  I  look 
again — bless  me! — sure  no  accident  has  happened 
among  the  canary  birds  or  the  gold  fishes  ?  Has  your 
brother  or  the  cat  been  meddling  ?  or  has  the  last 
novel  been  too  moving  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  No  ;  nothing  of  all  this.  1  have 
been  threatened — I  can  scarce  get  it  out — I  have  been 
threatened  with  a  lover. 

Miss  Neville  .     And  his  name ' 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Is  Marlow. 

Miss  Neville.     Indeed ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.     The  son  of  Sir  Charles  Marlow. 

Miss  Neville.  As  I  live,  the  most  intimate  friend  of 
Mr.  Hastings,  my  admirer.  They  are  never  asunder. 
I  believe  you  must  have  seen  him  when  we  lived  in 
town. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Never. 

Miss  Neville.  He's  a  very  singular  character,  I  assure 
you.  Among  women  of  reputation  and  virtue,  he  is 
the  modestest  man  alive  ;  but  his  acquaintance  give 
him  a  very  different  character  among  creatures  of  an- 
other stamp — you  understand  me. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  An  odd  character  indeed.  I  shall  j^ 
never  be  able  to  manage  him.  What  shall  I  do  !  Pshaw, 
think  no  more  of  him,  but  trust  to  occurrences  for  suc- 
cess. But  how  goes  on  your  own  affair,  ray  dear  ?  has 
my  mother  been  courting  you  for  my  brother  Tony,  as 
usual ? 

Miss  Neville.  I  have  just  come  from  one  of  our 
agreeable  tete-d-tetes.     She  had  been  saying  a  hundred 


262  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  , 

tender  things,  and  setting  off  her  pretty  monster  as 
the  very  pink  of  perfection. 

Miss  Hardastle.  And  her  partiality  is  such,  that  she 
actually  thinks  him  so.  A  fortune  like  yours  is  no 
small  temptation.  Besides,  as  she  has  the  sole  manage- 
ment of  it,  I'm  not  surprised  to  see  her  unwilling  to  let 
it  go  out  of  the  family. 

Miss  Neville.  A  fortune  like  mine,  which  chiefly 
consists  in  jewels,  is  no  such  mighty  temptation.  But 
at  any  rate,  if  my  dear  Hastings  be  but  constant,  I 
make  no  doubt  to  be  too  hard  for  her  at  last.  How- 
ever, I  let  her  suppose  that  I  am  in  love  with  her  son  ; 
and  she  never  once  dreams  that  my  affections  are  fixed 
upon  another. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  My  good  brother  hold s  out  stoutly. 
I  could  almost  love  him  for  hating  you  so. 

Miss  Neville.  It  is  a  good-natured  creature  at  bot- 
,  tom,  and  I'm  sure  would  wish  to  see  me  married  to  any- 
body but  himself.  But  my  aunt's  bell  rings  for  our 
afternoon's  walk  round  the  improvements.  Ailons  I 
Courage  is  necessary,  as  our  affairs  are  critical. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Would  it  were  bed-time,  and  all 
were  well.  [^Exeunt. 

Scene  n. — an  alehouse  room. 

Several  shabby  fellows  with  punch  and  tobacco  /  Tony 
at  the  head  of  the  table,  a  little  higher  tha/n  the  7'est^ 
a  mallet  in  his  hand. 

Om-nes.     Hurrea !  hurrea  !  hurrea !  bravo  1 
J^irst  Fellow.    Now,  gentlemen,  silence  for  a  song: 
The  Squire  is  going  to  knock  himself  down  for  a  song. 

Orrmes.    Ay,  a  song,  a  song  I 

•-■   ■    / 


4 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  263 

Tony.     Then  I'll  sing  you,  gentlemen,  a  song  I  made 
upon  this  alehouse,  The  Three  Pigeons. 

SONG. 

Let  schoolmasters  puzzle  their  brain 

With  grammar,  and  nonsense,  and  learning ; 
Good  liquor,  I  stoutly  maintain, 

Gives  ge7ius  a  better  discerning. 
Let  them  brag  of  their  heathenish  gods, 

Their  Lethes,  their  Styxes,  and  Stygians, 
Their  quis,  and  their  quces,  and  their  quods, 

They're  all  but  a  parcel  of  pigeons. 

Toroddle,  toroddle,  toroU. 

When  methodist  preachers  come  down, 

A-preaching  that  drinking  is  sinful, 
I'll  wager  the  rascals  a  crown, 

They  always  preach  best  with  a  skinf  ull. 
But  when  you  come  down  with  your  pence, 

For  a  slice  of  their  scurvy  religion, 
I'll  leave  it  to  all  men  of  sense, 

But  you,  my  good  friend,  are  the  pigeon. 

Toroddle,  toroddle,  torolL 

Then  come,  put  the  jorum  about, 

And  let  us  be  merry  and  clever. 
Our  hearts  and  our  liquors  are  stout. 

Here's  the  Three  Jolly  Pigeons  for  ever. 
Let  some  cry  up  woodcock  or  hare. 

Your  bustards,  your  ducks,  and  your  widgeons  ; 
But  of  all  the  birds  in  the  air. 

Here's  health  to  the  Three  Jolly  Pigeons. 

Toroddle,  toroddle,  toroll. 

Omnes.     Bravo,  bravo ! 

First  Fellow.  The  Squire  has  got  some  spunk  in 
him. 

Second  Fellow.  I  loves  to  hoar  him  sing,  bekeays 
he  never  gives  us  nothing  that's  low. 


264  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Third  Fellow.  Oh,  damn  anything  that's  low,  I 
cannot  bear  it. 

Fourth  Fellow.  The  genteel  thing  is  the  genteel 
thing  any  time ;  if  so  be  that  a  gentleman  bees  in  a 
concatenation  accordingly. 

Third  Fellow.  I  like  the  maxum  of  it,  Master  Mug- 
gins.  "What  though  I  am  obligated  to  dance  a  bear, 
a  man  may  be  a  gentleman  for  all  that.  May  this  be 
my  poison,  if  my  bear  ever  dances  but  to  the  very  gen- 
teelest  of  tunes;  "  "Water  parted,"  or  "  The  minuet  in 
Ariadne." 

Second  Felloiu.  "What  a  pity  it  is  the  Squire  is  not 
come  to  his  own.  It  would  be  well  for  all  the  publi- 
cans with  ten  miles  round  of  him. 

Tony.  Ecod,  and  so  it  would,  Master  Slang.  I'd 
then  show  what  it  was  to  keep  choice  of  company. 

Second  Fellow.  Oh,  he  takes  after  his  own  father 
for  that.  To  be  sure,  old  Squire  Lumpkin  was  the 
finest  gentleman  I  ever  set  my  eyes  on.  For  winding 
the  straight  horn,  or  beating  a  thicket  for  a  hare  or  a 
wench,  he  never  had  his  fellow.  It  was  a  saying  in 
the  place,  that  he  kept  the  best  horses,  dogs,  and  girls, 
in  the  whole  county. 

Tony.  Ecod,  and  when  I'm  of  age  I'll  be  no  bastard, 
I  promise  you.  I  have  been  thinking  of  Bet  Bouncer 
and  the  miller's  gray  mare  to  begin  with.  But  come, 
my  boys,  drink  about  and  be  merry,  for  you  pay  no 
reckoning.     Well,  Stingo,  what's  the  matter  ? 

Enter  Landlord. 

Landlord.  There  be  two  gentlemen  in  a  post-chaise 
at  the  door.      They  have  lost  their  way  upon  the 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  265 

forest;  and  they  are  talking  something  about  Mr. 
Hardcastle. 

Tony.  As  sure  as  can  be,  one  of  them  must  be  the 
gentleman  that's  coming  down  to  court  my  sister.  Do 
they  seem  to  be  Londoners  ? 

Landlord.  I  believe  they  may.  They  look  woundily 
like  Frenchmen. 

Tony.  Then  desire  them  to  step  this  way,  and  I'll 
set  them  right  in  a  twinkling.  {^Exit  Landlord. 

Gentlemen,  as  they  mayn't  be  good  enough  company 
for  you,  step  down  for  a  moment,  and  I'll  be  with  you 
in  the  squeezing  of  a  lemon.  \Exeunt  mob. 

Tony.  (Alone.)  Father-in-law  has  been  calling  me 
whelp  and  hound  this  half  year.  Now,  if  I  pleased,  I 
could  be  so  revenged  upon  the  old  grumbletonian. 
But  then  I'm  afraid, — afraid  of  what  ?  I  shall  soon  be 
worth  fifteen  hundred  a  year,  and  let  him  frighten  me 
out  of  that  if  he  can. 

Enter  Jjandlord,  conducting  Marlow  and  Hastings. 

Marlow.  What  a  tedious,  uncomfortable  day  have 
we  had  of  it !  We  were  told  it  was  but  forty  miles 
across  the  country,  and  we  have  come  above  three- 
score. 

Hastings.  And  all,  Marlow,  from  that  unaccount- 
able reserve  of  yours,  that  would  not  let  us  inquire  more 
frequently  on  the  w^ay. 

Marlow.  I  own,  Hastings,  I  am  unwilling  to  lay 
myself  under  an  obligation  to  every  one  I  meet ;  and 
often  stand  the  chance  of  an  unmannerly  answer. 

Hastings.  At  present,  however,  we  are  not  likely 
to  receive  any  answer. 


266  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Tony.  No  offence,  gentlemen.  But  I'm  told  you 
have  been  inquiring  for  one  Mr.  Hardcastle,  in  these 
parts.  Do  you  know  what  part  of  the  country  you 
are  in  ? 

Hastings.  Not  in  the  least,  sir,  but  should  thank 
you  for  information. 

Tony.     Nor  the  way  you  came  ? 

Hastings.     No,  sir  ;  but  if  you  can  inform  us 

Tony.  Why,  gentlemen,  if  you  know  neither  the 
road  you  are  going,  nor  where  you  are,  nor  the  road 
you  came,  the  first  thing  I  have  to  inform  you  is,  that 
— you  have  lost  your  way. 

Marlow.     "We  wanted  no  ghost  to  tell  us  that. 

Tony.  Pray,  gentlemen,  may  I  be  so  bold  as  to  ask 
the  place  from  whence  you  came  ? 

Marlow.  That's  not  necessary  towards  directing  us 
where  we  are  to  go. 

Tony.  No  offence  ;  but  question  for  question  is  all 
fair,  you  know.  Pray,  gentlemen,  is  not  this  same 
Hardcastle  a  cross-grained,  old-fashioned,  whimsical 
fellow,with  an  ugly  face  :  a  daughter,  and  a  prett}'-  son  ? 

Hastvngs.  We  have  not  seen  the  gentleman  ;  but 
lie  has  the  family  you  mention. 

Tony.  The  daughter,  a  tall,  trapesing,  trolloping, 
talkative  maypole  ;  the  son,  a  pretty,  well-bred,  agree- 
able youth,  that  every  body  is  fond  of? 

Marlow.  Our  information  differs  in  this.  The 
daughter  is  said  to  be  well-bred,  and  beautiful ;  the 
son  an  awkward  booby,  reared  up  and  spoiled  at  his 
mother's  apron-string. 

Tony.  He-he-hem !  — Then,  gentlemen,  all  I  have 
to  tell  you  is,  that  you  won't  reach  Mr,  Hardcastle's 
house  this  night,  I  believe. 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  267 

Hastings.    Unfortunate ! 

Tony.  It's  a  damned  long,  dark,  boggy,  dirty,  dan- 
gerous way.  Stingo,  tell  the  gentlemen  the  way  to 
Mr.  Hardcastle's  {wmking  ujpon  the  Landlord)^  Mr. 
Hardcastle's  of  Quagmire  Marsh — you  understand  me  ? 

Landlord.  Master  Hardcastle's  !  Lock-a-daisy,  my 
masters,  you're  come  a  deadly  deal  wrong!  "When 
you  came  to  the  bottom  of  the  hill,  you  should  have 
crossed  down  Squash  Lane. 

Marlow.     Cross  down  Squash  Lane  ? 

Landlord.  Then  you  were  to  keep  straight  forward, 
till  you  came  to  four  roads. 

Marlow.     Come  to  where  four  roads  meet  ? 

Tony.  Ay ;  but  you  must  be  sure  to  take  only  one 
of  them. 

Marlow.     O  sir,  you're  facetious. 

Tony.  Then  keeping  to  the  right,  you  are  to  go 
sideways,  till  you  come  upon  Crack-skull  common : 
there  you  must  look  sharp  for  the  track  of  the  wheel, 
and  go  forward  till  you  come  to  farmer  Murrain's 
barn.  Coming  to  the  farmer's  barn,  you  are  to  turn 
to  the  right,  and  then  to  the  left,  and  then  to  the  right 
about  again,  till  you  find  out  the  old  mill 

Marlow.  Zounds,  man  !  we  could  as  soon  find  out 
the  longitude. 

Hastings.     "What's  to  be  done,  Marlow  ? 

Marlow.  This  house  promises  but  a  poor  reception  ; 
though  perhaps  the  landlord  can  accommodate  us. 

Landlord.  Alack,  master,  we  have  but  one  spare 
bed  in  the  whole  house. 

Tony.  And  to  my  knowledge,  that's  taken  up  by 
three  lodgers  already.  {After  a  pause  in  which  the 
rest  seem  disconcerted.)     I  have  hit  it :  don't  you  think, 

22— G  &  G— L 


268  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Stingo,  our  landlady  could  accommodate  the  gentle- 
men by  the  fireside,  with — three  chairs  and  a  bolster  ? 

Hastings.     I  hate  sleeping  by  the  fireside. 

Marlow.  And  I  detest  your  three  chairs  and  a  bol- 
ster. 

Tony.  You  do,  do  you  ? — then,  let  me  see, — what 
if  3'ou  go  on  a  mile  farther,  to  the  Buck's  Head ;  the 
old  Buck's  Head  on  the  hill,  one  of  the  best  inns  in  the 
w^hole  country. 

Hastings.  O  ho !  so  we  have  escaped  an.  adventure 
for  this  night,  however. 

Landlord.  {Ajyart  to  Tony.)  Sure,  you  ben't  send- 
ing them  to  your  father's  as  an  inn,  be  you  ? 

To7iy.  Mum,  you  fool  you.  Let  them  find  that  out. 
{To  thein.)  You  have  only  to  keep  on  straight  for- 
ward, till  you  come  to  a  large  old  house  by  the  road- 
side. You'll  see  a  pair  of  large  horns  over  the  door. 
That's  the  sign.  Drive  up  the  yard,  and  call  stoutly 
about  you. 

Hastings.  Sir,  w^e  are  obliged  to  you.  The  servants 
can't  miss  the  way  ? 

Tony.  No,  no :  but  I  tell  you  though  the  landlord 
is  rich,  and  going  to  leave  off  business ;  so  he  wants  to 
be  thought  a  gentleman,  saving  your  presence,  he  !  he  ! 
be !  He'll  be  for  giving  you  his  company  ;  and,  ecod, 
if  you  mind  him,  he'll  persuade  you  that  his  mother 
was  an  alderman,  and  his  aunt  a  justice  of  peace. 

Landlord.  A  troublesome  old  blade,  to  be  sure; 
but  as  keeps  good  wanes  and  beds  as  any  in  the  whole 
countrv. 

Marlow.  "Well,  if  he  supplies  us  with  these,  we 
shall  want  no  further  connection.  We  are  to  turn  to 
the  right,  did  you  say  % 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  269 

Tony.  No,  no,  straight  forward  ;  I'll  just  step  my- 
self, and  show  you  a  piece  of  the  way.  {To  the  Land- 
lord.)    Mum ! 

Landlord.  Ah,  bless  your  heart,  for  a  sweet,  pleas- 
ant— damned  mischievous  son  of  a  whore.        [Exeunt. 


ACT  SECOND. 
Scene  I.— an  old-fashioned  house. 

Enter  Hardcastle,  followed  hy  three  or  four  aioTcward 

Servants. 

Hardcastle.     Well,  I  hope  you  are   perfect  in  the  0> 
table  exercise  1  have  been  teaching  you  these  three 
days.     You  all  know  your  posts  and  your  places,  and 
can  show  that  you  have  been  used  to  good  company, 
without  ever  stirring  from  home. 

Omnes.     Ay,  ay. 

Llardcastle.  "When  company  comes,  you  are  not  to 
pop  out  and  stare,  and  then  run  in  again,  like  frighted 
rabbits  in  a  warren. 

Omnes.     No,  no. 

Hardcastle.  You,  Diggory,  whom  I  have  taken  from 
the  barn,  are  to  make  a  show  at  the  side  table ;  and 
you,  Roger,  whom  I  have  advanced  from  the  plough, 
are  to  place  yourself  behind  my  chair.  But  you're  not 
to  stand  so,  with  your  hands  in  your  pockets.  Take 
your  hands  from  your  pockets,  Roger — and  from  your 
head,  you  blockhead,  you.  See  how  Diggory  carries 
his  hands.  They're  little  too  stiff,  indeed,  but  that's 
no  great  matter. 


270  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Diggory.  Ay,  mind  how  I  hold  them.  I  learned 
to  hold  my  hands  this  way,  when  I  was  upon  drill  for 
the  militia.     And  so  being  upon  drill 

Hardcastle.  You  must  not  be  so  talkative,  Diggory. 
You  must  be  all  attention  to  the  guests  ;  you  must  hear 
us  talk,  and  not  think  of  talking ;  3^ou  must  see  us 
drink,  and  not  think  of  drinking;  you  must  see  us  eat, 
and  not  think  of  eating. 

Diggory.  By  the  laws,  your  worship,  that's  per- 
fectly un possible.  Whenever  Diggory  sees  yeating 
going  forward,  ecod,  he's  always  wishing  for  a  mouth- 
ful himself. 

Hardaastle.  Blockhead !  is  not  a  bellyful  in  the 
kitchen  as  good  as  a  bellyful  in  the  parlor  ?  Stay  your 
stomach  with  that  reflection. 

Diggory.  Ecod,  I  thank  3'^our  worship,  I'll  make  a 
shift  to  stay  my  stomach  wdth  a  slice  of  cold  beef  in 
the  pantry. 

Hardcastle.  Diggory,  you  are  too  talkative.  Then 
if  I  happen  to  say  a  good  thing,  or  tell  a  good  story  at 
table,  you  must  not  all  burst  out  a-laughing,  as  if  you 
made  part  of  the  company. 

Diggory.  Then,  ecod,  your  worship  must  not  tell 
the  story  of  the  Ould  Grouse  in  the  gun-room  ;  I  can't 
help  laughing  at  that — he !  he !  he  ! — for  the  soul  of 
me.  We  have  laughed  at  that  these  twenty  years — 
ha !  ha !  ha  ! 

Hardcastle.  Ha !  ha  !  ha  !  The  story  is  a  good  one. 
Well,  honest  Diggory,  you  may  laugh  at  that ;  but 
still,  remember  to  be  attentive.  Suppose  one  of  the 
company  should  call  for  a  glass  of  wine,  how  will  you 
behave  ?  A  glass  of  wine,  sir,  if  you  please.  {To 
Diggory) — Eh,  why  don't  you  move  % 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  271 

Diggory.  Ecod,  your  worship,  I  never  have  courage, 
till  I  see  the  eatables  and  drinkables  brought  upo'  the 
table,  and  then  I'm  as  bauld  as  a  lion. 

Hardcastle.     What,  will  nobody  move  ? 

First  Servant.     I'm  not  to  leave  this  pleace. 

Second  Servant.     I'm  sure  it 's  no  pleace  of  mine. 

Third  Servant.     Nor  mine,  for  sartain, 

Diggory.     Wauns,  and  I'm  sure  it  canna  be  mine. 

Hardcastle.  You  numskulls !  and  so  Avhile,  like 
your  betters,  you  are  quarrelling  for  places,  the  guests 
must  be  starved,     O  you  dunces !     I  find  I  must  begin 

all  over  again But  don't  I  hear  a  coach   drive  into 

to  the  yard  ?  To  your  posts,  you  blockheads.  I'll  go 
in  the  meantime,  and  give  my  old  friend's  son  a  hearty 
welcome  at  the  gate.  [^Exit  Hardcastle. 

Diggory.  By  the  elevens,  my  place  is  quite  gone 
out  my  head. 

Roger.     I  know  that  my  place  is  to  be  every  where. 

First  Servant.     "Where  the  devil  is  mine  ? 

Second  Servant.  My  pleace  is  to  be  no  where  at  all, 
and  so  Ize  go  about  my  business. 

\_Exeunt  Servants,  running  about  as  if 
frightened,  several  ways. 

Enter  Servant,  with   candles,  showing  in  Marlow  and 

Hastings. 

Servant.  "Welcome,  gentlemen,  very  welcome  !  This 
way. 

Hastings.  After  the  disappointments  of  the  day, 
welcome  once  more,  Charles,  to  the  comforts  of  a  clean 
room  and  a  good  fire.  Upon  ray  word,  a  very  well- 
looking  house  :  antique,  but  creditable. 


272  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Marlow.  The  usual  fate  of  a  large  mansion. 
Having  first  ruined  the  master  by  good  housekeeping, 
it  at  last  comes  to  levy  contributions  as  an  inn. 

Hastings.  As  you  say,  we  passengers  are  to  be  taxed 
to  pay  all  these  fineries.  I  have  often  seen  a  good 
sideboard,  or  a  marble  chimney-piece,  though  not 
actually  put  in  the  bill,  inflame  a  reckoning  con- 
foundedly. 

Mai-iow.  Travellers,  George,  must  pay  in  all  places  ; 
the  only  difference  is,  that  in  good  inns  you  pay  dearly 
for  luxuries,  in  bad  inns  you  are  fleeced  and  starved. 

Hastings.  You  have  lived  pretty  much  among  them. 
In  truth  I  have  been  often  surprised,  that  you  who 
have  seen  so  much  of  the  world,  with  your  natural 
good  sense,  and  your  many  opportunities,  could  never 
yet  acquire  a  requisite  share  of  assurance. 

Marlovj.  The  Englishman''s  malady.  But  tell  me, 
George,  where  could  I  have  learned  that  assurance  you 
talk  of  ?  My  life  has  been  chiefly  spent  in  a  college 
or  an  inn,  in  seclusion  from  that  lovely  part  of  the  crea- 
tion that  chiefly  teach  men  confidence.  I  don't  know 
that  I  was  ever  familiarly  acquainted  with  a  single 
modest  woman,  except  my  mother. — But  among  females 
of  another  class,  you  know 

Hastings.  Ay,  among  them  you  are  impudent 
enough,  of  all  conscience. 

Marlow.     They  are  of  us,  you  know. 

Hastings.  But  in  the  company  of  women  of  reputa- 
tion I  never  saw  such  an  idiot — such  a  trembler  ;  you 
look  for  all  the  world  as  if  j^ou  wanted  an  opportunity 
of  stealing  out  of  the  room. 

Marlow.  Why,  man,  that's  because  I  do  want  to 
steal  out  of  the  room.     Faith,  I  have  often  formed  a 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  273 

resolution  to  break  the  ice,  and  rattle  away  at  any  rate. 
But  I  don't  know  how,  a  single  glance  from  a  pair  of 
fine  eyes  has  totally  overset  my  resolution.  An  im- 
pudent fellow  may  counterfeit  modesty,  but  I'll  be 
hanged  if  a  modest  man  can  ever  counterfeit  impu- 
dence. 

Hastings.  If  you  could  but  say  half  the  fine  things 
to  them  that  1  have  heard  3'ou  lavish  upon  the  bar- 
maid of  an  inn,  or  even  a  college  bed-maker 

Marlow.  Why,  George,  I  can't  say  fine  things  to 
them — they  freeze,  they  petrify  me.  They  may  talk 
of  a  comet,  or  a  burning  mountain,  or  some  such 
bagatelle,  but  to  me  a  modest  woman,  dressed  out  in 
all  her  finery,  is  the  most  tremendous  object  of  the 
whole  creation. 

Hastings.  Ha  !  ha  !  ha  !  At  this  rate,  man,  how 
can  you  ever  expect  to  marry  ? 

Marlow.  Never  ;  unless  as  among  kings  and  princes 
my  bride  were  to  be  courted  by  proxy.  If,  indeed,  like 
an  Eastern  bridegroom,  one  were  to  be  introduced  to  a 
wife  he  never  saw  before,  it  might  be  endured.  But  to 
go  through  all  the  terrors  of  a  formal  courtship,together 
with  the  episode  of  aunts,  grandmothers,  and  cousins, 
and,  at  last  to  blurt  out  the  broad  staring  question  of 
*  Madam,  will  you  marry  me  ? '  No,  no,  that's  a  strain 
much  above  me,  I  assure  you, 

Hastings.  1  pity  you.  But  how  do  you  intend 
behaving  to  the  lady  you  are  come  down  to  visit  at  the 
request  of  your  father  ? 

Marlov).  As  I  behave  to  all  other  ladies  :  bow  very 
low  ;  answer  yes  or  no  to  all  her  demands.  But  for  the 
rest,  I  don't  think  I  shnll  venture  to  look  in  her  face 
till  I  see  my  father's  again. 


274  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Hastings.  I'm  surprised  that  one  who  is  so  warm 
a  friend  can  be  so  cool  a  lover, 

Marloiv.  To  be  explicit,  my  dear  Hastings,  my 
chief  inducement  down  was  to  be  instrumental  m 
forwarding  your  happiness,  not  my  own.  Miss  Neville 
loves  you,  the  family  don't  know  you ;  as  my  friend, 
you  are  sure  of  a  reception,  and  let  honor  do  the 
rest. 

Hastings.  My  dear  Marlow  ! — But  I'll  suppress  the 
emotion.  Were  I  a  wretch,  meanly  seeking  to  carry 
off  a  fortune,  you  should  be  the  last  man  in  the  world 
I  would  apply  to  for  assistance.  But  Miss  Neville's 
person  is  all  I  ask,  and  that  is  mine,  both  from  her 
deceased  father's  consent,  and  her  own  inclination. 

Marlow.  Happy  man  !  You  have  talents  and  art  to 
captivate  any  woman.  I'm  doomed  to  adore  the  sex, 
and  yet  to  converse  with  the  only  part  of  it  I  despise. 
This  stammer  in  my  address,  and  this  awkward,  unpre- 
possessing visage  of  mine  can  never  permit  me  to  soar 
above  the  reach  of  a  milliner's  prentice  or  one  of  the 
Duchesses  of  Drury  lane.  Pshaw  !  this  fellow  here 
to  interrupt  us. 

Enter  Hardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  Gentlemen,  once  more  you  are  heartily 
welcome.  Which  is  Mr.  Marlow  ?  Sir,  you  are  heartily 
welcome.  It 's  not  my  way,  you  see,  to  receive  my 
friends  with  my  back  to  the  fire.  I  like  to  give  them 
a  hearty  reception  in  the  old  style  at  my  gate.  I  like 
to  see  their  horses  and  trunks  taken  care  of. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  He  has  got  our  names  from  the 
servants  already.  {To  him.)  We  approve  your  cau- 
tion and  hospitality,  sir.     {To  Hastings^    I  have  been 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  275 

thinking,  George,  of  changing  our  travelling  dresses 
in  the  morning.  I  am  grown  confoundedly  ashamed  of 
mine. 

Hardcastle.  I  beg,  Mr.  Marlow,  you'll  use  no  cere- 
mony in  this  house. 

Hastings.  I  fancy,  Charles,  you  're  right ;  the  first 
blow  is  half  the  battle.  I  intend  opening  the  campaign 
with  the  white  and  gold. 

Hardcastle.  Mr.  Marlow — Mr.  Hastings — gentle- 
men, pray  be  under  no  restraint  in  this  house.  This  is 
Liberty-hall,  gentlemen.  You  may  do  just  as  you 
please  here. 

Marlow.  Yet,  George,  if  we  open  the  campaign  too 
fiercely  at  first,  we  may  want  ammunition  before  it  is 
over.  I  think  to  reserve  the  embroidery  to  secure  a 
retreat. 

Hardcastle.  Your  talking  of  a  retreat,  Mr.  Marlow, 
puts  me  in  mind  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough,  when 
we  went  to  besiege  Denaiu.     He  first  summoned  the 


garrison 

Marlow.  Don't  you  think  the  ventre  d''or  waistcoat 
will  do  with  the  plain  brown  ? 

Hardcastle.  He  first  summoned  the  garrison,  wiiich 
might  consist  of  about  five  thousand  men 

Hastings.  I  think  not :  brown  and  yellow  mix  but 
very  poorly. 

Hardcastle.  I,  sa}'',  gentlemen,  as  I  was  telling  you, 
he  summo'ned  the  garrison,  which  might  consist  of 
about  five  thousand  men 

Marlow.     The  girls  like  finery. 

Hardcastle.  Which  might  consist  of  about  five  thou- 
sand men,  well  appointed  Avith  stores,  ammunition,  and 
other  implements  of  war.     Now,  says  the  Duke   of 


276  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Marlborough  to  George  Brooks,  that  stood  next  to 
him — you  must  have  heard  of  George  Brooks — "  I'll 
pawn  my  dukedom,"  says  he,  "  but  I  take  that  garrison 
without  spilling  a  drop  of  blood."     So 

Marlow.  What,  my  good  friend,  if  you  gave  us  a 
glass  of  punch  in  the  mean  time ;  it  would  help  us  to 
carry  on  the  siege  with  vigor. 

Hardcastle.  Punch,  sir !  {Aside.)  This  is  the 
most  unaccountable  kind  of  modesty  I  ever  met  with. 

Marlow.  Yes,  sir,  punch.  A  glass  of  warm  punch 
after  our  journey,  will  be  comfortable.  This  is  Liberty- 
hall,  you  know. 

Enter  Roger  with  a  cup. 

Hardcastle.     Here's  a  cup,  sir. 

Marlow.  (Aside.)  So  this  fellow,  in  his  Liberty- 
hall,  will  only  let  us  have  just  what  he  pleases. 

Hardcastle.  {Taking  the  cup.)  I  hope  you'll  find  it 
to  your  mind.  I  have  prepared  it  with  my  own  hands, 
and  I  believe  you'll  own  the  ingredients  are  tolerable. 
Will  you  be  so  good  as  to  pledge  me,  sir  ?  Here,  Mr. 
Marlow,  here  is  to  our  better  acquaintance.     {Drinks.) 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  A  very  impudent  fellow  this ; 
but  he's  a  character,  and  I'll  humor  him  a  little.  Sir, 
my  service  to  you.     {Drinks.) 

Hastings.  {Aside.)  I  see  this  fellow  wants  to  give 
us  his  company,  and  forgets  that  he's  an  innkeeper, 
before  he  has  learned  to  be  a  gentleman. 

Marlow.  From  the  excellence  of  your  cup,  my  old 
friend,  I  suppose  you  have  a  good  deal  of  business  in 
this  part  of  the  country.  Warm  work,  now  and  then, 
at  elections,  I  suppose. 

Hardcastle.    No,  sir,  I  have  long  given  that  work 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  277 

over.  Since  our  betters  have  hit  upon  the  expedient 
of  electing  each  other,  there  is  no  business  "  for  us  that 
sell  ale." 

Hastings.  So,  then,  you  have  no  turn  for  politics,  I 
find. 

Hardcastle.  Not  in  the  least.  There  was  a  time, 
indeed,  I  fretted  myself  about  the  mistakes  of  govern- 
ment, like  other  people  ;  but,  finding  myself  every  day 
grow  more  angry,  and  the  government  growing  no 
better,  I  left  it  to  mend  itself.  Since  that,  I  no  more 
trouble  my  head  about  Hyder  Ally,  or  Ally  Cawn, 
than  about  Ally  Croaker.     Sir,  my  service  to  you. 

Hastings.  So  that  with  eating  above  stairs  and 
drinking  below,  with  receiving  your  friends  within 
and  amusing  them  without,  you  lead  a  good,  pleasant, 
bustling  life  of  it. 

Hardcastle.  I  do  stir  about  a  great  deal,  that's  cer- 
tain. Half  the  differences  of  the  parish  are  adjusted 
in  this  very  parlor. 

Marlow.  {After  dri7iking.)  And  you  have  an  argu- 
ment in  3^our  cup,  old  gentleman,  better  than  any  in 
Westminster-hall. 

Hardcastle.  Ay,  young  gentleman,  that,  and  a  little 
philosophy. 

Marlovj.  {Aside.)  Well,  this  is  the  first  time  I 
ever  heard  of  an  innkeeper's  philosophy. 

Hastings.  So,  then,  like  an  experienced  general,  you 
attack  them  on  every  quarter.  If  you  find  their  rea- 
son manageable,  you  attack  it  with  your  philosophy ; 
if  you  find  they  have  no  reason,  you  attack  them  with 
tins.     Here 's  your  health,  my  philosopher.     {Drinks.) 

Hardcastle.  Good,  very  good,  thank  you  ;  ha !  ha ! 
ha!     Your  generalship    puts  me   in  mind   of  Princo 


278  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Eugene,  when  he  fought  ^the  Turks  at  the  battle  of 
Belgrade.     You  shall  hear. 

Marlow.  Instead  of  the  battle  of  Belgrade,  I  believe 
it 's  almost  time  to  talk  about  supper.  What  has  your 
philosophy  got  in  the  house  for  supper  ? 

Hardcastle.  For  supper,  sir!  {Aside.)  Was  ever 
such  a  request  to  a  man  in  his  own  house ! 

Marlow.  Yes,  sir,  supper,  sir ;  I  begin  to  feel  an 
appetite.  I  shall  make  devilish  work  to-night  in  the 
larder,  I  promise  you. 

Hardcastle.  {Aside.)  Such  a  brazen  dog  sure  never 
my  eyes  beheld.  {To  him.)  Why,  really  sir,  as  for 
supper  I  can't  well  tell.  My  Dorothy  and  the  cook- 
maid  settle  these  things  between  them.  I  leave  these 
kind  of  things  entirely  to  them. 

Marlow.     You  do,  do  you  ? 

Hardcastle.  Entirely.  By  the  by,  I  believe  they 
are  in  actual  consultation  upon  what 's  for  supper  this 
moment  in  the  kitchen. 

Marlow.  Then  I  beg  they'll  admit  me  as  one  of 
their  privy-council.  It's  a  way  I  have  got.  When  I 
travel  I  always  choose  to  regulate  my  own  supper. 
Let  the  cook  be  called.     No  offence,  I  hope,  sir. 

Hardcastle.  O,  no,  sir,  none  in  the  least ;  yet  I 
don't  know  now,  our  Bridget,  the  cook-maid,  is  not 
very  communicative  upon  these  occasions.  Should 
we  send  for  her,  she  might  scold  us  all  out  of  the 
house. 

Hastings.  Let's  see  your  list  of  the  larder,  then.  I 
ask  it  as  a  favor.  I  always  match  my  appetite  to  my 
bill  of  fare. 

Marlow.  {To  Hardcastle^  who  looJcs  at  them  with 
surprise.)    Sir,  he 's  very  right,  and  it 's  my  way,  too. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  279 

nardcastle.  Sir,  you  have  a  right  to  command  here. 
Here,  Roger,  bring  us  the  bill  of  fare  for  to-night's 
supper ;  I  believe  it 's  drawn  out. — Your  manner,  Mr. 
Hastings,  puts  me  in  mind  of  my  uncle,  Colonel  Wal- 
lop. It  was  a  saying  of  his,  that  no  man  was  sure  of 
his  supper  till  he  had  eaten  it. 

Enter  Roger, 

Hastings.  {Aside.)  All  upon  the  high  rope !  His 
uncle  a  colonel !  we  shall  soon  hear  of  his  mother 
being  a  justice  of  the  peace.  But  let's  hear  the  bill  of 
fare. 

Marlow.  {Perusing.)  What's  here  ?  For  the  first 
course  ;  for  the  second  course  ;  for  the  dessert.  The 
devil,  sir,  do  you  think  we  have  brought  down  the 
whole  Joiners'  Company,  or  the  Corporation  of  Bed- 
ford, to  eat  up  such  a  supper  ?  Two  or  three  little 
things,  clean  and  comfortable,  will  do. 

Hastings.     But  let's  hear  it. 

Ma/rlow.  {Reading.)  "  For  the  first  course, — at  the 
top  a  pig,  and  pruin-sauce." 

Hastings.     Damn  your  pig,  I  say. 

Marlow.     And  damn  your  pruin-sauce,  say  I. 

Hardcastle.  And  yet,  gentlemen,  to  men  that  are 
hungry,  pig  with  pruin-sauce  is  very  good  eating. 

Marlow.  "  At  the  bottom  a  calf 's  tongue  and 
brains." 

Hastings.     Let  your  brains  be  knocked,  out,  my  good 
sir,  I  don't  like  them. 

Marlow.  Or  you  may  clap  them  on  a  plate  by  them- 
selves. 

Hardcastle.     {Aside.)     Their  impudence  confounds 


280  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

me.  {To  them.)  Gentlemen,  you  are  my  guests,  make 
what  alterations  you  please.  Is  there  anything  elso 
you  wish  to  retrench,  or  alter,  gentlemen  ? 

Marlow.  "  Item  :  A  pork  pie,  a  boiled  rabbit  and 
sausages,  a  Florentine,  a  shaking  pudding,  and  a  dish 
of  tiff — taff — taffety  cream  !  " 

Hastings.  Confound  your  made  dishes  ;  I  shall  be 
as  much  at  a  loss  in  this  house  as  at  a  green  and  yellow 
dinner  at  the  French  ambassador's  table.  I'm  for 
plain  eating. 

Hardcastle.  I'm  sorry,  gentlemen,  that  I  have  noth- 
ing 3''ou  like ;  but  if  there  be  anything  you  have  a 
particular  fancy  to 

Marlow.  Why,  really,  sir,  your  bill  of  fare  is  so 
exquisite,  that  any  one  part  of  it  is  full  as  good  as  an- 
other. Send  us  what  you  please.  So  much  for  sup- 
per. And  now  to  see  that  our  beds  are  aired,  and 
properly  taken  care  of. 

Hardcastle.  I  entreat  you'll  leave  all  that  to  me. 
You  shall  not  stir  a  step. 

Harlow.  Leave  that  to  you  !  I  protest,  sir,  you 
must  excuse  me :  I  always  look  to  these  things  my- 
self. 

Hardcastle.  I  must  insist,  sir,  you'll  make  yourself 
easy  on  that  head. 

Marlow.  You  see  I'm  resolved  on  it.  {Aside.)  A 
very  troublesome  fellow  this,  as  ever  I  met  with. 

Hardcastle.  Well,  sir,  I'm  resolved  at  least  to  at- 
tend you.  {Aside.)  This  may  be  modern  modesty, 
but  I  never  saw  anything  look  so  like  old-fashioned 
impudence.  \_Exeunt  Marlow  and  Hardcastle. 

Hastings.  {Alone.)  So  I  find  this  fellow's  civil- 
fbies  begin  to  grow  troublesome.     But  who  can  be  an- 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  281 

gry  at  those  assiduities  which  are  meant  to  please 
him  ?  Ha  !  what  do  I  see  ?  Miss  Neville,  by  all  that's 
happy  I 

Enter  Miss  Neville. 

Miss  Neville.  My  dear  Hastings  !  To  what  unex- 
pected good  fortune — to  what  accident,  am  I  to  as- 
cribe this  happy  meeting  ? 

Hastings.  Either  let  me  ask  the  same  question,  as 
I  could  never  have  hoped  to  meet  my  dearest  Con- 
stance at  an  inn. 

Miss  Neville.  An  inn  !  sure  you  mistake  :  my  aunt, 
my  guardian,  lives  here.  What  could  induce  you  to 
think  this  house  an  inn  ? 

Hastings.  My  friend,  Mr.  Marlow,  with  whom  I 
came  down,  and  I,  have  been  sent  here  as  to  an  inn,  I 
assure  you.  A  young  fellow  whom  we  accidentally 
met  at  a  house  hard  by,  directed  us  hither. 

Miss  Neville.  Certainly  it  must  be  one  of  my  hope- 
ful cousin's  tricks,  of  whom  you  have  heard  me  talk 
so  often  ;  ha !  ha  !  ha ! 

Hastings.  He  whom  your  aunt  intends  for  you  ?  he 
of  whom  I  have  such  just  apprehensions  ? 

Miss  Neville.  You  have  nothing  to  fear  from  him, 
I  assure  you.  You'd  adore  him  if  you  knew  how 
heartily  he  despises  me.  My  aunt  knows  it  too,  and 
has  undertaken  to  court  me  for  him,  and  actually  be- 
gins to  think  she  has  made  a  conquest. 

Hastings.  Thou  dear  dissembler !  You  must  know, 
my  Constance,  I  have  just  seized  this  happy  opportu- 
nity of  my  friend's  visit  here  to  get  admittance  into 
the  family.  The  horses  that  carried  us  down  are  now 
fatigued  with  their  journey,  but  they'll  soon  be  re- 


282  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

freshed  ;  and,  then,  if  my  dearest  girl  will  trust  in  her 
faithful  Hastings,  we  shall  soon  be  landed  in  France, 
where  even  among  the  slaves  the  laws  of  marriage  are 
respected. 

Miss  Nemlle.  I  have  often  told  you,  that  though 
ready  to  obey  you,  I  yet  should  leave  my  little  fortune 
behind  with  reluctance.  The  greatest  part  of  it  was 
left  me  by  my  uncle,  the  India  director,  and  chiefly 
consists  in  jewels.  I  have  been  for  some  time  persuad- 
ing my  aunt  to  let  me  wear  them.  I  fancy  I'm  very 
near  succeeding.  The  instant  they  are  put  into  my 
possession,  you  shall  find  me  ready  to  make  them  and 
myself  yours. 

Hastings.  Perish  the  baubles !  Your  person  is  aU 
I  desire.  In  the  meantime,  my  friend  Marlow  must 
not  be  let  into  his  mistake.  I  know  the  strang^e  re- 
serve  of  his  temper  is  such,  that  if  abruptly  informed 
of  it,  he  would  instantly  quit  the  house  before  our  plan 
Was  ripe  for  execution. 

Miss  Nemlle.  But  how  shall  we  keep  him  in  the 
deception  ? — Miss  Hardcastle  is  just  returned  from 
walking — What  if  we  still  continue  to  deceive  him  ? 
— This,  this  way \T^^y  confer. 

Enter  Marlow. 

Marlow.  The  assiduities  of  these  good  people  tease 
me  beyond  bearing.  My  host  seems  to  think  it  iU 
manners  to  leave  me  alone,  and  so  he  claps  not  only 
himself,  but  his  old-fashioned  wife  on  my  back.  They 
talk  of  coming  to  sup  with  us  too;  and  then,  I  suppose, 
we  are  to  run  the  gauntlet  through  all  the  rest  of  the 
family.     What  have  we  got  here  % 

Hastings.     My  dear  Charles !     Let  me  congratulate 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  COJSTQUER.  283 

• 

you — The  most  fortunate  accident  ! — Who  do  you 
think  is  just  alighted  ? 

Marlow.     Cannot  guess. 

Hastings.  Our  mistresses,  boy,  Miss  Hardcastle  and 
Miss  Neville.  Give  me  leave  to  introduce  Miss  Con- 
stance Neville  to  your  acquaintance.  Happening  to 
dine  in  the  neighborhood,  they  called  on  their  return 
to  take  fresh  horses  here.  Miss  Hardcastle  has  just 
stept  into  the  next  room,  and  will  be  back  in  an  in- 
stant.    "Wasn't  it  lucky  ?  eh  ! 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  I  have  been  mortified  enough  of 
all  conscience,  and  here  comes  something  to  complete 
my  embarrassment. 

Hastings.  Well,  but  wasn't  it  the  most  fortunate 
thing  in  the  world  ? 

Marlow.  Oh,  yes.  Yery  fortunate — a  most  joyful 
encounter.  But  our  dresses,  George,  you  know,  are  in 
disorder — What  if  we  should  postpone  the  happiness 
till  to-morrow  ? — to-morrow  at  her  own  house — It  will 
be  every  bit  as  convenient — and  rather  more  respect- 
ful— To-morrow  let  it  be.  [  Offering  to  go. 

Hastings.  By  no  means,  sir.  Your  ceremony  will 
displease  her.  The  disorder  of  your  dress  will  show 
the  ardor  of  your  impatience.  Besides,  she  knows  you 
are  in  the  house,  and  will  permit  you  to  see  her. 

Marlow.  Oh,  the  devil !  How  shall  I  support  it  ? 
— Hem  !  hem  !  Hastings,  you  must  not  go.  You  are 
to  assist  me,  you  know.  I  shall  be  confoundedly  ridic- 
ulous.    Yet  hang  it !  I'll  take  courage.     Hem  ! 

Hastings.  Pshaw,  man  I  it's  but  the  first  plunge, 
and  all's  over.     She's  but  a  woman,  you  know. 

Marlow.  And  of  all  women,  she  that  I  dread  most 
to  encounter. 


284  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

« 

Enter  Miss  Hardcastle,  as  returned  from  walking. 

Hastings.  {Introducing  them.)  Miss  Hardcastle, 
Mr.  Mario \v,  I'm  proud  of  bringing  two  persons  of 
such  merit  together,  that  only  want  to  know,  to  esteem 
each  other. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {Aside.)  Now  for  meeting  my 
modest  gentleman  with  a  demure  face,  and  quite  in 
his  own  manner.  {After  a  pause,  in  which  he  appears 
very  uneasy  and  disconcerted.)  I'm  glad  of  your  safe 
arrival,  sir.  I'm  told  you  had  some  accidents  by  the 
way. 

Marlow.  Only  a  few,  madam.  Yes,  we  had  some. 
Yes,  madam,  a  good  many  accidents,  but  should  be 
sorry — madam — or  rather  glad  of  any  accidents — that 
are  so  agreeably  concluded.     Hem ! 

Hastings.  {To  him.)  You  never  spoke  better  in 
your  whole  life.  Keep  it  up,  and  I'll  insure  you  the 
victory. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I'm  afraid  you  flatter,  sir.  You 
that  have  seen  so  much  of  the  finest  company,  can 
find  little  entertainment  in  an  obscure  corner  of  the 
country. 

Marlow.  {Gathering  courage.)  I  have  lived,  indeed, 
in  the  world,  madam  ;  but  I  have  kept  very  little  com- 
pany. I  have  been  but  an  observer  upon  life,  madam, 
while  others  were  enjoying  it. 

Miss  Neville.  But  that,  I  am  told,  is  the  way  to 
enjoy  it  at  last. 

Hastings.  {To  him.)  Cicero  never  spoke  better. 
Once  more,  and  you  are  confirmed  in  assurance  forever. 

Marlow.  {To  him.)  Hem  !  stand  by  me  then,  and 
when  I'm  down,  throw  in  a  word  or  two  to  set  me  up 
again. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  285 

Miss  Hardcastle.  An  observer,  like  you,  upon  life, 
were,  1  fear,  disagreeably  employed,  since  you  must 
have  had  much  more  to  censure  than  to  approve. 

Marlow.  Pardon  me,  madam,  I  was  always  will- 
ing to  be  amused.  The  folly  of  most  people  is  rather 
an  object  of  mirth  than  uneasiness. 

Hastings.  {To  him.)  Bravo,  bravo.  Never  spoke 
so  well  in  your  whole  life.  Well,  Miss  Hardcastle,  I 
see  that  you  and  Mr.  Marlow  are  going  to  be  very 
good  company.  I  believe  our  being  here  will  but  em- 
Wrrass  the  interview. 

MaHow.  Not  in  the  least,  Mr.  Hastings.  We  like 
your  company  of  all  things.  {To  him.)  Zounds, 
George,  sure  you  won't  go  ?  how  can  you  leave  us  ? 

Hastings.  Our  presence  will  but  spoil  conversation, 
so  we'll  retire  to  the  next  room.  {To  him.)  You 
don't  consider,  man,  that  we  are  to  manage  a  little 
t6te-a-tete  of  our  own.  \Exeunt. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {After  a  jyause.)  But  you  have 
not  been  wholly  an  observer,  I  presume,  sir :  the  ladies, 
I  should  hope,  have  employed  some  part  of  your  ad- 
dresses. 

Marlow.  {Relapsing  into  timidittj.)  Pardon  me, 
madam,  I — I — I — as  yet  have  studied — only — to — de- 
serve them. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  And  that,  some  say,  is  the  very 
worst  way  to  obtain  them. 

Marlow.  Perhaps  so,  madam.  But  I  love  to  con- 
verse only  with  the  more  grave  and  sensible  part  of 
the  sex — But  I'm  afraid  I  grow  tiresome. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Not  at  all,  sir ;  there  is  nothing 
I  like  so  much  as  grave  conversation  myself  ;  I  could 
bear  it  forever.     Indeed  I  have  often  been  surprised 


286  SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

how  a  man  of  sentiment  could  ever  admire  those  light, 
airy  pleasures,  where  nothing  reaches  the  heart. 

Marlow.     It's a  disease of  the  mind,  madam, 

in  the  variety  of  tastes  there  must  be  some  who,  want- 
ing a  relish for um — u — um — 

Miss  Ilardcastle.  I  understand  you,  sir.  There 
must  be  some  who,  wanting  a  relish  for  refined  pleas- 
ures, pretend  to  despise  what  they  are  incapable  of 
tasting. 

Marlow.  My  meaning,  madam,  but  infinitely  better 
expressed.     And  1  can't  help  observing—,   -a 

Miss  Ilardcastle.  {Aside.)  Who  could  ever  suppose 
this  fellow  impudent  upon  some  occasions  !  {To  him.) 
You  were  going  to  observe,  sir, 

Marlow.  I  was  observing,  madam, — I  protest, 
madam,  I  forget  what  I  was  going  to  observe. 

Miss  JSardcastle.  {Aside.)  I  vow  and  so  do  I.  {To 
him.)  You  were  observing,  sir,  that  in  this  age  of 
hypocrisy, — something  about  hypocrisy,  sir. 

Marlow.  Yes,  madam.  In  this  age  of  hypocrisy 
there  are  few  who,  upon  strict  inquiry,  do  not — a — 

a 

Miss  Ilardcastle.     I  understand  you  perfectly,  sir. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  Egad!  and  that's  more  than  I 
do  myself. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  You  mean  that,  in  this  hypocritical 
age,  there  are  a  few  who  do  not  condemn  in  public 
what  they  practise  in  private,  and  think  they  pay  every 
debt  to  virtue  when  they  praise  it. 

Marlow.  True,  madam ;  those  who  have  most  virtue 
in  their  mouths  have  least  of  it  in  their  bosoms.  But 
I'm  sure  I  tire  you,  madam. 

Miss  Ma/rdcastle.    Not  in  the  least,  sir  ;  there's  some- 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  287 

thing  so  agreeable  and  spirited  in  your  manner,  such, 
life  and  force, — pray,  sir,  go  on. 

Marlow.     Yes,  madam,  I  was  saying that  there 

are  some  occasions — when  a  total   want  of  courage, 

madam,  destroys  all  the and  puts  us upon a 

— a — a 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  agree  with  you  entirely  ;  a  want 
of  courage  upon  some  occasions,  assumes  the  appear- 
ance of  ignorance,  and  betrays  us  when  we  most  want 
to  excel.     I  beg  you'll  proceed. 

Marlow.  Yes,  madam.  Morally  speaking,  madam 
— but  I  see  Miss  Neville  expecting  us  in  the  next  room. 
I  would  not  intrude  for  the  world. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  protest,  sir,  I  never  was  more 
agreeably  entertained  in  all  my  life.     Pray  go  on. 

Marlow.     Yes,  madam,  I  was But  she   beckons 

us  to  join  her.  Madam,  shall  I  do  myself  the  honor 
to  attend  you  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Well,  then,  I'll  follow. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  This  pretty  smooth  dialogue  has 
done  for  me.  [JExif. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {Alone.)  Ha !  ha  !  ha !  Was  there 
ever  such  a  sober,  sentimental  interview  ?  I'm  certain 
he  scarce  looked  in  my  face  the  whole  time.  Yet  the 
fellow,  but  for  his  unaccountable  bashf ulness,  is  pretty 
well  too.  He  has  good  sense,  but  then  so  buried  in 
his  fears,  that  it  fatigues  one  more  than  ignorance.  If 
I  could  teach  him  a  little  confidence,  it  would  be  doing 
somebody  that  I  know  of  a  piece  of  service.  But  who 
is  that  somebody.  That,  faith,  is  a  question  I  can 
scarce  answer.  [JExit. 

Enter  Tony  and  Miss  Neville^  followed  hj  Mrs.  Hard- 
castle  and  Hastings. 


4 


288  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Tony.  What  do  you  follow  me  for,  cousin  Con  ?  I 
wonder  you're  not  ashamed  to  be  so  very  engaging. 

Miss  Neville.  I  hope,  cousin,  one  may  speak  to  one's 
own  relations,  and  not  be  to  blame. 

Tony.  Ay,  but  I  know  what  sort  of  a  relation  you 
■want  to  make  me  though  ;  but  it  won't  do.  I  tell  you, 
cousin  Con,  it  won't  do ;  so  I  beg  you'll  keep  your 
distance — I  want  no  nearer  relationship. 

[She  follows,  coquetting!  him  to  the  hack  scene. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  "Well,  I  vow,  Mr.  Hastings,  you 
are  very  entertaining.  There's  nothing  in  the  world 
I  love  to  talk  of  so  much  as  London,  and  the  fashions ; 
though  I  was  never  there  myself. 

Hastings,  l^ever  there  !  You  amaze  me !  From  your 
air  and  manner,  I  concluded  you  had  been  bred  all 
your  life  either  at  Eanelagh,  St.  James's  or  Tower 
Wharf. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Oh,  sir,  you're  only  pleased  to  say 
so.  We  country  persons  can  have  no  manner  at  all. 
I'm  in  love  with  the  town,  and  that  serves  to  raise  me 
above  some  of  our  neighboring  rustics  ;  but  who  can 
have  a  manner,  that  has  never  seen  the  Pantheon,  the 
Grotto  Gardens,  the  Borough,  and  such  places,  where 
the  nobility  chiefly  resort  %  All  I  can  do  is  to  enjoy 
London  at  second-hand.  I  take  care  to  know  every 
tete-a-tete  from  the  Scandalous  Magazine,  and  have 
all  the  fashions,  as  they  come  out,  in  a  letter  from  the 
two  Miss  Eickets  of  Crooked  Lane.  Pray,  how  do  you 
like  this  head,  Mr.  Hastings  ? 

Hastings.  Extremely  elegant  and  degagee,  upon  my 
word,  madam.  Your  friseur  is  a  Frenchman,  I  sup- 
pose? 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  289 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  I  protest,  I  dressed  it  myself  from 
a  print  in  tlie  Ladies'  Memorandum-book  for  the  last 
year. 

Hastings.  Indeed  !  Such  a  head  in  a  side-box  at  the 
play-house,  would  draw  as  many  gazers  as  my  Lady 
Mayoress  at  a  city  ball. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  I  vow,  since  inoculation  began, 
there  is  no  such  thing  to  be  seen  as  a  plain  woman ;  so 
one  must  dress  a  little  particular,  or  one  may  escape 
in  the  crowd. 

Hastings.  But  that  can  never  be  your  case,  madam, 
in  any  dress.     {Bowing.) 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Yet  what  signifies  my  dressing 
when  I  have  such  a  piece  of  antiquity  by  my  side  as 
Mr.  Hardcastle  ?  all  I  can  say  will  never  argue  down 
a  single  button  from  his  clothes.  I  have  often  wanted 
him  to  throw  off  his  great  flaxen  wig,  and  where  he 
was  bald,  to  plaster  it  over,  like  ray  Lord  Pately,  with 
powder. 

Hastings.  You  are  right,  madam  ;  for,  as  among  the 
ladies  there  are  none  ugly,  so  among  the  men  there  are 
none  old. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  But  what  do  you  think  his  answer 
was  ?  Why,  with  his  usual  Gothic  vivacity,  he  said  I 
only  wanted  him  to  throw  off  his  wig  to  convert  it  into 
a  tete  for  my  own  wearing. 

Hastings.  Intolerable !  At  your  age  you  may  wear 
what  you  please,  and  it  must  become  you. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Pray,  Mr.  Hastings,  what  do  you 
take  to  be  the  most  fashionable  age  about  town  ? 

Hastings.  Some  time  ago,  forty  was  all  the  mode  ; 
but  I'm  told  the  ladies  intend  to  bring  up  fifty  for  the 
ensuing  winter. 


290  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Seriously  ?  Then  I  shall  be  too 
young  for  the  fashion. 

Hastings.  No  lady  begins  now  to  put  on  jewels  till 
she's  past  forty.  For  instance,  miss  there,  in  a  polite 
circle,  would  be  considered  as  a  child — a  mere  maker 
of  samplers. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  And  yet,  my  niece  thinks  her- 
self as  much  a  woman,  and  is  as  fond  of  jewels,  as  the 
oldest  of  us  all. 

Hastings.  Your  niece,  is  she?  And  that  young 
gentleman — a  brother  of  yours,  I  should  presume  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  My  son,  sir.  They  are  contracted 
to  each  other.  Observe  their  little  sports.  They  fall 
in  and  out  ten  times  a  day,  as  if  they  were  man  and 
wife  already.  {To  them.)  Well,  Tony,  child,  what 
soft  things  are  you  saying  to  your  cousin  Constance 
this  evening  ? 

Tony.  I  have  been  saying  no  soft  things ;  but  that 
it's  very  hard  to  be  followed  about  so.  Ecod !  I've 
not  a  place  in  the  house  now  that's  left  to  myself,  but 
the  stable. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Never  mind  him,  Con,  my  dear : 
he's  in  another  story  behind  your  back. 

Miss  Neville.  There's  something  generous  in  my 
cousin's  manner.  He  falls  out  before  faces,  to  be  for- 
given in  private, 

Tony.     That's  a  damned  confounded — crack. 

Mi's.  Hardcastle.  Ah !  he's  a  sly  one.  Don't  you 
think  they're  like  each  other  about  the  mouth,  Mr. 
Hastings  ?  The  Blenkmsop  mouth  to  a  T.  They're  of 
a  size,  too.  Back  to  back,  my  pretties,  that  Mr.  Hast- 
ings may  see  you.     Come,  Tony. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  291 

Tony.    You  had  as  good  not  make  me,  I  tell  you. 

(Measuring.) 

Miss  Neville.  O  lud !  he  has  almost  cracked  my 
head. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Oh,  the  monster!  for  shame, 
Tony.     You  a  man,  and  behave  so ! 

Tony.  If  I'm  a  man,  let  me  have  my  fortin.  Ecod, 
I'll  not  be  made  a  fool  of  no  longer. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Is  this,  ungrateful  boy,  all  that 
I'm  to  get  for  the  pains  I  have  taken  in  your  educa- 
tion ?  I  that  have  rocked  you  in  your  cradle,  and  fed 
that  pretty  mouth  with  a  spoon  ?  Did  not  I  work  that 
waistcoat  to  make  you  genteel  ?  Did  not  I  prescribe 
for  you  every  day,  and  weep  while  the  receipt  was 
operating  ? 

Tony.  Ecod  !  you  had  reason  to  weep,  for  you  have 
been  dosing  me  ever  since  I  was  born.  I  have  gone 
through  every  receipt  in  the  Complete  Housewife  ten 
times  over ;  and  you  have  thoughts  of  coursing  me 
through  Quincey  next  spring.  But,  Ecod !  I  tell  you, 
I'll  not  be  made  a  fool  of  no  longer. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  "Wasn't  it  all  for  your  good,  viper? 
"Wasn't  it  all  for  your  good  ? 

Tony,  I  wish  you'd  let  me  and  my  good  alone,  then. 
Snubbing  this  way  when  I'm  in  spirits !  If  I'm  to 
have  any  good,  let  it  come  of  itself  ;  not  to  keep  ding- 
ing it,  dinging  it  into  one  so. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  That's  false  ;  I  never  see  you  when 
you're  in  spirits.  No,  Tony,  you  then  go  to  the  ale- 
house or  kennel.  I'm  never  to  be  delighted  with  your 
agreeable  wild  notes,  unfeeling  monster ! 

Tuny.  Ecod !  mamma,  your  own  notes  are  the 
wildest  of  the  two. 

22r—Q  &  a— M 


292  SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  "Was  ever  the  like  ?  But  I  see  he 
wants  to  break  my  heart ;  T  see  he  does. 

Hastings.  Dear  madam,  permit  me  to  lecture  the 
young  gentleman  a  little.  I'm  certain  I  can  persuade 
him  to  his  duty. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  "Well,  I  must  retire.  Come,  Con- 
stance, my  love.  You  see,  Mr.  Hastings,  the  wretch- 
edness of  my  situation :  was  ever  poor  woman  so 
plagued  with  a  dear,  sweet,  pretty,  provoking,  unduti- 
f ul  boy ! 

\Exeunt  Mrs.  Hardcastle  and  Miss  Neville. 

Tony.     {Singing.) 

There  was  a  young  man  riding  by, 
And  fain  would  have  his  will. 

Rang  do  didlo  dee. 

Don't  mind  her.  Let  her  cry.  It's  the  comfort  of 
her  heart.  I  have  seen  her  and  sister  cry  over  a  book 
for  an  hour  together ;  and  they  said  they  liked  the 
book  the  better  the  more  it  made  them  cry. 

Hastings.  Then  you're  no  friend  to  the  ladies,  I 
find,  my  pretty  young  gentleman  ? 

Tony.     That's  as  I  find  'um. 

Hastings.  Not  to  hear  of  your  mother's  choosing,  I 
dare  answer  ?  And  yet  she  appears  to  me  a  pretty, 
well-tempered  girl, 

Tony.  That's  because  you  don't  know  her  as  well 
as  I.  Ecod !  I  know  every  inch  about  her ;  and 
there's  not  a  more  bitter  cantanckerous  toad  in  all 
Christendom. 

Hastings.  {Aside.)  Pretty  encouragement  for  a 
lover. 

Tony.     I   have  seen  her  since  the  height  of  that. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEE.  293 

She  has  as  many  tricks  as  a  hare  in  a  thicket,  or  a  colt 
the  first  day's  breaking. 

Hastings.     To  me  she  appears  sensible  and  silent. 

Tony.  Aj,  before  company.  But  when  she's 
with  her  playmates,  she's  as  loud  as  a  hog  in  a 
gate, 

Hastings.  But  there  is  a  meek  modesty  about  her 
that  charms  me. 

Tony.  Yes,  but  curb  her  never  so  little,  she  kicks 
up,  and  you're  flung  in  a  ditch. 

Hastings.  Well,  but  you  must  allow  her  a  little 
beauty.     Yes,  you  must  allow  her  some  beauty. 

Tony.  Bandbox !  She's  all  a  made-up  thing,  mun. 
Ah  !  could  you  but  see  Bet  Bouncer  of  these  parts,  you 
might  then  talk  of  beauty.  Ecod !  she  has  two  eyes  as 
black  as  sloes,  and  cheeks  as  broad  and  red  as  a  pulpit 
cushion.     She'd  make  two  of  she. 

Hastings.  Well,  what  say  you  to  a  friend  that  would 
take  this  bitter  bargain  off  your  hands  ? 

Tony.    An  an ! 

Hastings.  "Would  you  thank  him  that  would  take 
Miss  Neville,  and  leave  you  to  happiness  and  your  dear 
Betsey  ? 

Tony.  Ay  ;  but  where  is  there  such  a  friend — for 
who  would  take  her  ? 

Hastings.  I  am  he.  If  you  but  assist  me,  I'll  en- 
gage to  whip  her  off  to  France,  and  you  shall  never 
hear  more  of  her. 

Tony.  Assist  you  !  Ecod  I  will  to  the  last  drop  of 
my  blood.  I'll  clap  a  pair  of  horses  to  your  chaise 
that  shall  trundle  you  off  in  a  twinkling,  and  may  be 
get  you  a  part  of  her  fortin  besides,  in  jewels,  that 
you  little  dream  of. 


294  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Hastings.  My  dear  Squire,  this  looks  like  a  lad  of 
spirit. 

To7iy.  Come  along,  then,  and  you  shall  see  more  of 
my  spirit  before  you  have  done  with  me.     {Singing.) 

We  are  the  boys 

That  fears  no  noise, 

Where  the  thundering  cannons  roar. 

[Exeunt 


■i 


ACT  THIRD. 

Enter  Ilardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  "What  could  my  old  friend  Sir  Charles 
mean  by  recommending  his  son  as  the  modestest  young 
man  in  town  ?  To  me  he  appears  the  most  impudent 
piece  of  brass  that  ever  spoke  with  a  tongue.  He  has 
taken  possession  of  the  easy  chair  by  the  fire-side  al- 
ready. He  took  off  his  boots  in  the  parlor,  and  de- 
sired me  to  see  them  taken  care  of.  I'm  desirous  to 
know  how  his  impudence  affects  my  daughter.  She 
will  certainly  be  shocked  at  it. 

Enter  Miss  Ilardcastle,  plainly  dressed. 

Ilardcastle.  Well,  my  Kate,  I  see  you  have  changed 
your  dress,  as  I  bid  you  ;  and  yet,  I  believe,  there  was 
no  great  occasion. 

Miss  Ilardcastle.  I  find  such  a  pleasure,  sir,  in  obey- 
ing your  commands,  that  I  take  care  to  observe  them 
without  ever  debating  their  propriety. 

Ilardcastle.  And  yet,  Kate,  I  sometimes  give  you 
some  cause,  particularly  when  I  recommended  my 
modest  gentleman  to  you  as  a  lover  to-day. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  295 

Miss  Hardeastle.  You  taught  me  to  expect  some- 
thing extraordinary,  and  I  find  the  original  exceeds 
the  description. 

Ha/rdcastle.  I  was  never  so  surprised  iu  my  life ! 
He  has  quite  confounded  all  my  faculties. 

Miss  Hardeastle.     I  never  saw  anything  like  it ;  and  -^ 
a  man  of  the  world,  too ! 

Hardeastle.     Ay,  he  learned  it  all  abroad — what  a  ^ 
fool  was  I,  to  think  a  young  man  could  learn  modesty   ^ 
by  travelling.     He  might  as  soon  learn  wit  at  a  raas- 
"juerade. 

Miss  Hardeastle.     It  seems  all  natural  to  him. 

Hardeastle.  A  good  deal  assisted  by  bad  company 
and  a  French  dancing-master. 

Miss  Hardeastle.  Sure  you  mistake,  papa.  A 
French  dan  ing-master  could  never  have  taught  him 
that  timid  look — that  awkward  address — that  bashful 
manner. 

Hardeastle.     "Whose  look  ?  whose  manner,  child  ? 

Miss  Hardeastle.  Mr.  Marlow's  :  his  mauvaise  horde, 
his  timidity,  struck  me  at  the  first  sight. 

Hardeastle.  Then  your  first  sight  deceived  you : 
for  I  think  him  one  of  the  most  brazen  first  sights  that 
ever  astonished  my  senses. 

Miss  Hardeastle.  Sure,  sir,  you  rally  !  I  never  saw 
any  one  so  modest. 

Hardeastle.  And  can  you  be  serious  ?  I  never  saw 
such  a  bouncing,  swaggering  puppy  since  I  was  born. 
Bully  Dawson  was  but  a  fool  to  him. 

Miss  Hardeastle.  Surprising  !  He  met  me  with  a 
respectful  bow,  a  stammering  voice,  and  a  look  fixed 
on  the  ground. 

Hardeastle.     He  met  me  with  a  loud  voice,  a  lordly 


296  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

air,  and  a  familiarity  that  made  my  blood  freeze 
again. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  He  treated  me  with  diffidence  and 
respect ;  censured  the  manners  of  the  age ;  admired 
the  prudence  of  girls  that  never  laughed,  tired  me  with 
apologies  for  being  tiresome,  then  left  the  room  with 
a  bow,  and  '  Madame,  I  would  not  for  the  world  detain 
you.' 

Hardcastle.  He  spoke  to  me  as  if  he  knew  me  all 
his  life  before,  asked  twenty  questions,  and  never 
waited  for  an  answer,  interrupted  my  best  remarks 
with  some  silly  pun,  and  when  I  was  in  my  best  story 
of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough  and  Prince  Eugene,  he 
asked  if  I  had  not  a  good  hand  at  making  punch. 
Yes,  Kate,  he  asked  your  father  if  he  was  a  maker  of 
punch. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  One  of  us  must  certainly  be  mis- 
taken. 

Hardcastle.  If  he  be  what  he  has  shown  himself, 
I'm  determined  he  shall  never  have  my  consent. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  And  if  he  be  the  sullen  thing  I 
take  him,  he  shall  never  have  mine. 

Hardcastle.  In  one  thing,  then,  we  are  agreed — to 
reject  him. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Yes — but  upon  conditions.  For 
if  you  should  find  him  less  impudent,  and  I  more  pre- 
suming ;  if  you  find  him  more  respectful,  and  I  more 
importunate — I  don't  know — the  fellow  is  well  enough 
for  a  man — certainly  we  don't  meet  many  such  at  a 
horse-race  in  the  country. 

Hardcastle.    If  we  should  find  him  so But  that's 

impossible.  The  first  appearance  has  done  my  busi- 
ness.   I'm  seldom  deceived  in  that. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  297 

Miss  Rardcastle.  And  yet  there  may  be  many  good 
qualities  under  that  first  appearance. 

Rardcastle.  Ay,  when  a  girl  finds  a  fellow's  outside 
to  her  taste,  she  then  sets  about  guessing  the  rest  of 
his  furniture.  With  her  a  smooth  face  stands  for  good 
sense,  and  a  genteel  figure  for  every  virtue. 

Miss  Rardcastle.  "I  hope,  sir,  a  conversation  begun 
with  a  compliment  to  my  good  sense,  won't  end  with 
a  sneer  at  my  understanding ! 

Rardcastle.  Pardon  me,  Kate.  But  if  young  Mr. 
Brazen  can  find  the  art  of  reconciling  contradictions, 
he  may  please  us  both,  perhaps. 

Miss  Rardcastle.  And  as  one  of  us  must  be  mis- 
taken, what  if  we  go  to  make  farther  discoveries  ? 

Rardcastle.  Agreed.  But  depend  on't,  I'm  in  the 
right. 

Miss  Rardcastle.  And,  depend  on't,  I'm  not  much 
in  the  wrong.  \Exeunt. 

Enter  Tony,  running  in  with  a  casket. 

Tony.  Ecod !  I  have  got  them.  Here  they  are. 
My  cousin  Con's  necklaces,  bobs  and  all.  My  mother 
shan't  cheat  the  poor  souls  out  of  their  fortin  neither. 
O  my  genus,  is  that  you  ? 

Enter   Rastings. 

Rastings.  My  dear  friend,  how  have  you  managed 
with  your  mother  ?  I  hope  you  have  amused  her  with 
pretending  love  for  your  cousin,  and  that  you  are  will- 
ing to  be  reconciled  at  last  ?  Our  horses  will  be  re- 
freshed in  a  short  time,  and  we  shall  soon  be  ready  to 
set  off. 

Tony.     And  here's  something  to  bear  your  charges 


298  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

by  the  way — {giving  the  casket) — your  sweetheart's 
jewels.  Keep  them  ;  and  hang  those,  I  say,  that  would 
rob  you  of  one  of  them. 

Hastings.  But  how  have  you  procured  them  from 
your  mother  ? 

Tony.  Ask  me  no  questions,  and  I'll  tell  you  no 
fibs.  I  procured  them  by  the  rule  of  thumb,  if  I  had 
not  a  key  to  every  draw  in  my  mother's  bureau,  how 
could  I  go  to  the  alehouse  so  often  as  I  do  ?  An 
honest  man  may  rob  himself  of  his  own  at  any  time. 

Hastings.  Thousands  do  it  every  day.  But,  to  be 
plain  with  you.  Miss  Neville  is  endeavoring  to  procure 
them  from  her  aunt  this  very  instant.  If  she  suc- 
ceeds it  will  be  the  most  delicate  way,  at  least,  of 
obtaining  them. 

Tony.  Well,  keep  them,  until  you  know  how  it  will 
be.  But  I  know  how  it  will  be  well  enough, — she'd  as 
soon  part  with  the  only  sound  tooth  in  her  head. 

Hastings.  But  I  dread  the  effects  of  her  resentment 
when  she  finds  she  has  lost  them. 

Tony.  Never  you  mind  her  resentment ;  leave  me  to 
manage  that.  I  don't  value  her  resentment  the  bounce 
of  a  cracker.  Zounds !  here  they  are.  Morrice  I 
Prance !  [^Exit  Hastings. 

Tony^   Mrs.  Hardcastle^  and  Miss  Neville. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Indeed,  Constance,  you  amaze 
me.  Such  a  girl  as  you  want  jewels  !  It  will  be  time 
enough  for  jewels,  my  dear,  twenty  years  hence,  when 
your  beauty  begins  to  want  repairs. 

Miss  Neville.  But  what  will  repair  beauty  at  forty, 
will  certainly  improve  it  at  twenty,  madam. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle,     Yours,  my  dear,  can  admit  of 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  299 

none.  That  natural  blush  is  beyond  a  thousand  orna- 
ments. Besides,  child,  jewels  are  quite  out  at  present. 
Don't  you  see  half  the  ladies  of  our  acquaintance,  my 
Lady  Kildaylight,  and  Mrs.  Crump,  and  the  rest  of 
them,  carry  their  jewels  to  town,  and  bring  nothing 
but  paste  and  marcasites  back  ? 

Miss  Neville.  But  who  knows,  madam,  but  some- 
body that  shall  be  nameless  would  like  me  best  with 
all  my  little  finery  about  me  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Consult  your  glass,  my  dear,  and 
then  see  if,  with  such  a  pair  of  eyes,  you  want  any 
better  sparklers.  What  do  you  think,  Tony,  my  dear? 
Does  your  cousin  Con  want  any  jewels  in  your  eyes  to 
set  off  her  beauty  ? 

Tony.     That's  as  hereafter  may  be. 

Miss  Nemlle.  My  dear  aunt,  if  you  knew  how  it 
would  oblige  me. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  A  parcel  of  old-fashioned  rose 
and  table-cut  things.  They  would  make  you  look  like 
the  court  of  King  Solomon  at  a  puppet-show.  Besides, 
I  believe  I  can't  readily  come  at  them.  They  may  be 
missing  for  aught  I  know  to  the  contrary. 

Tony.  {Apart  to  Mrs.  Hardcastle.)  Then  why  don't 
you  tell  her  so  at  once,  as  she's  so  longing  for  them  ? 
Tell  her  they're  lost.  It's  the  only  way  to  quiet  her. 
Say  they're  lost,  and  call  me  to  bear  witness. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {Apart  to  Tony.)  You  know,  my 
dear,  I'm  only  keeping  them  for  you.  So  if  I  say  they 
are  gone,  you'll  bear  me  witness,  will  you  ?  He  !  he  ! 
bo! 

Tony.  Never  fear  me.  Ecod  !  I'll  say  I  saw  them 
taken  out  with  my  own  eyes. 

Miss  Neville.     I  desire  them  but  for  a  day,  madam 


300  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

— just  to  be  permitted  to  show  them  as  relics,  and  then 
they  may  be  locked  up  again. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  To  be  plain  with  you,  my  dear 
Constance,  if  I  could  find  them  you  should  have  them. 
They  are  missing,  I  assure  you.  Lost,  for  aught  I 
know ;  but  we  must  have  patience,  wherever  they  are. 

Miss  Neville.  I'll  not  believe  it ;  this  is  but  a  shallow 
pretence  to  deny  me.  I  know  they  are  too  valuable  to 
be  so  slightly  kept,  and  as  you  are  to  answer  for  the 
loss — 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Don't  be  alarmed,  Constance.  If 
they  be  lost,  I  must  restore  an  equivalent.  But  my 
son  knows  they  are  missing,  and  not  to  be  found. 

Tony.  That  I  can  bear  witness  to.  They  are  miss- 
ing, and  not  to  be  found  ;  I'll  take  my  oath  on't. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  You  must  learn  resignation,  my 
dear ;  for  though  we  lose  our  fortune,  yet  we  should 
not  lose  our  patience.     See  me,  how  calm  I  am. 

Miss  Neville.  Ay,  people  are  generally  calm  at  the 
misfortunes  of  others. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Now,  I  wonder  a  girl  of  your  good 
sense  should  waste  a  thought  upon  such  trumpery.  We 
shall  soon  find  them ;  and  in  the  mean  time  you  shall 
make  use  of  my  garnets  till  your  jewels  be  found. 

Miss  Neville.     I  detest  garnets. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  The  most  becoming  things  in  the 
world  to  set  off  a  clear  complexion.  You  have  often 
seen  how  well  they  look  upon  me.  You  shall  have 
them.  \_Exit. 

Miss  Neville.  I  dislike  them  of  all  things.  You 
shan't  stir.  Was  ever  any  thing  so  provoking,  to  mis- 
lay ray  own  jewels  and  force  me  to  wear  her  trumpery  ? 

Tony.    Don't  be  a  fool.    If  she  gives  you  the  gar- 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  301 

nets  take  what  you  can  get.  The  jewels  are  your  own 
already.  I  have  stolen  them  out  of  her  bureau,  and 
she  does  not  know  it.  Fly  to  your  spark ;  he'll  tell 
you  more  of  the  matter.    Leave  me  to  manage  her. 

Miss  Neville.    My  dear  cousin  % 

Tony.  Vanish.  She's  here,  and  has  missed  them 
already.  {Exit  Miss  Neville.']  Zounds  !  how  she  fid- 
gets and  spits  about  like  a  Catharine  wheel. 

EnterMrs.  Harclcastle. 

Mrs  Hardcastle.  Confusion  !  thieves  !  robbers  !  we 
are  cheated,  plundered,  broke  open,  undone. 

Tony.  What's  the  matter,  what's  the  matter, 
mamma  ?  I  hope  nothing  has  happened  to  any  of  the 
good  family  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  We  are  robbed.  My  bureau  has 
been  broken  open,  the  jewels  taken  out,  and  I'm  undone. 

Tony.  Oh!  is  that  all?  Ha!  ha!  ha!  By  the 
laws  I  never  saw  it  better  acted  in  my  life.  Ecod,  I 
thought  you  was  ruined  in  earnest,  ha !  ha !  ha  ! 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Why,  boy,  I  am  ruined  in  earnest. 
My  bureau  has  been  broken  open,  and  all  taken 
away. 

Tony.  Stick  to  that,  ha !  ha !  ha !  stick  to  that.  I'll 
bear  witness,  you  know  !  call  me  to  bear  witness. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  I  tell  you,  Tony,  by  all  that's  pre- 
cious, the  jewels  are  gone,  and  I  shall  be  ruined  for- 
ever. 

Tony.  Sure  I  know  they  are  gone,  and  I  am  to  say 
so. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  My  dearest  Tony,  but  hear  me. 
They're  gone,  I  say. 

Tony.     By  the  laws,  mamma,  you  make  me  for  to 


302  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

laugh,  ha !  ha  1  I  know  who  took  them  well  enough, 
ha !  ha !  ha  ! 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Was  there  ever  such  a  blockhead, 
that  can't  tell  the  difference  between  jest  and  earnest  I 
I  can  tell  you  I'm  not  in  jest,  booby. 

Tony.  That's  right,  that's  right  ;  you  must  be  in  a 
bitter  passion,  and  then  nobody  will  suspect  either  of 
us.     I'll  bear  witness  that  they  are  gone. 

Jf/'s.  Hardcastle.  Was  there  ever  such  a  cross- 
grained  brute,  that  won't  hear  me!  Can  you  bear 
witness  that  you're  no  better  than  a  fool  ?  Was  ever 
poor  woman  so  beset  with  fools  on  one  hand,  and 
thieves  on  the  other  1 

Tony.    I  can  bear  witness  to  that. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Bear  witness  again,  you  block- 
head, you,  and  I'll  turn  you  out  of  the  room  directly. 
My  poor  niece,  what  will  become  of  her  ?  Do  you  laugh, 
you  unfeeling  brute,  as  if  you  enjoyed  my  distress  ? 

Tony.    I  can  bear  witness  to  that. 

Mrs.  HardcasUe.  Do  you  insult  me,  monster.  I'll 
teach  you  to  vex  your  mother,  I  will. 

Tony.  I  can  bear  witness  to  that.  {He  runs  off, 
she  follows  him.) 

Enter  Miss  Hardcastle  and  Maid. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  What  an  unaccountable  creature 
is  that  brother  of  mine,  to  send  them  to  the  house  as 
an  inn  ;  ha  !  ha  I  I  don't  wonder  at  his  impudence. 

Maid.  But  what  is  more,  madam,  the  young  gentle- 
man, as  you  passed  by  in  your  present  dress,  asked  me 
if  you  were  the  bar-maid.  He  mistook  you  for  the 
bar-maid,  madam ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Did  he?    Then,  as  I  live,  I'm 


BHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  303 

resolved  to  keep  up  the  delusion.  Tell  me,  Pimple, 
how  do  you  like  my  present  dress  ?  Don't  you  think 
I  look  something  like  Cherry  in  the  Beaux'  Stratagem. 

Maid.  It's  the  dress,  madam,  that  every  lady 
wears  in  the  country,  but  when  she  visits  or  receives 
company. 

Miss  Ha/rdcastle.  And  are  you  sure  he  does  not 
remember  my  face  or  person  % 

Maid.     Certain  of  it. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  vow  I  thought  so ;  for  though 
we  spoke  for  some  time  together,  yet  his  fears  were 
such  that  he  never  once  looked  up  during  the  inter- 
view. Indeed,  if  he  had,  my  bonnet  would  have  kept 
him  from  seeing  me. 

Maid.  But  what  do  you  hope  from  keeping  him  in 
his  mistake  2 

Miss  Hardcastle.  In  the  first  place,  I  shall  be  seen, 
and  that  is  no  small  advantage  to  a  girl  who  brings 
her  face  to  market.  Then  I  shall  perhaps  make  an 
acquaintance,  and  that's  no  small  victory  gained  over 
one  who  never  addresses  any  but  the  wildest  of  her 
sex.  But  my  chief  aim  is  to  take  my  gentleman  off  his 
guard,  and  like  an  invisible  champion  of  romance,  ex- 
amine the  giant's  force  before  I  offer  to  combat. 

Maid.  But  are  you  sure  you  can  act  your  part,  and 
disguise  your  voice  so  that  he  may  mistake  that,  as  he 
has  already  mistaken  your  person  ? 

Miss  Ha/rdcastle.  Never  fear  me.  I  think  I  have  got 
the  true  bar  cant — Did  your  honor  call  ? — Attend  the 
Lion  there. — Pipes  and  tobacco  for  the  Angel. — The 
Lamb  has  been  outrageous  this  half  hour. 

Maid.     It  will  do,  madam.     But  he's  here. 

\lkit  Maid. 


304  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Miter  Marlow. 

Marlow.  What  a  bawling  in  every  part  of  the 
house.  I  have  scarce  a  moment's  repose.  If  I  go  to 
the  best  room,  there  I  find  my  host  and  his  story  ;  if 
I  fly  to  the  gallery,  there  we  have  my  hostess  with 
her  courtesy  down  to  the  ground.  I  have  at  last  a 
moment  to  myself,  and  now  for  recollection. 

[  Walks  and  muses. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Did  you  call,  sir?  Did  your 
honor  call  ? 

Marlow.  {Musing.)  As  for  Miss  Hardcastle,  she's 
too  grave  and  sentimental  for  me. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Did  your  honor  call  ? 

[She  still  places  herself  hefore  him 
he  turning  away. 

Marlow.  No,  child.  {Musing.)  Besides,  from  the 
glimpse  I  had  of  her,  I  think  she  squints. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     I'm  sure,  sir,  I  heard  the  bell  ring. 

Marlow.  No,  no.  {Mtising.)  1  have  pleased  my 
father,  however,  by  coming  down,  and  I'll  to-morrow 
please  myself  by  returning.  {Taking  out  his  tablets  and 
perusing.) 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Perhaps  the  other  gentleman 
called,  sir. 

Marlow.     I  tell  you  no. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  1  should  be  glad  to  know,  sir ;  we 
have  such  a  parcel  of  servants. 

Marlow.  No,  no,  I  tell  you.  {ZooJcs  full  in  her 
face.)  Yes,  child,  I  think  I  did  call.  I  wanted— I 
wanted— I  vow,  child,  you  are  vastly  handsome. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     O  la,  sir,  you'll  make  one  ashamed. 

Marlow.    Never  saw   a  more  sprightly,  malicious 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  305 

eye.  Yes,  yes,  my  dear,  I  did  call.  Have  you  got 
any  of  your — a — what  d'ye  call  it,  in  the  house  ? 

Miss  Jlardcastle.  No,  sir,  we  have  been  out  of  that 
these  ten  days. 

Maidow.  One  may  call  in  this  house,  I  find,  to  very 
little  purpose.  Suppose  I  should  call  for  a  taste,  just 
by  way  of  trial,  of  the  nectar  of  your  lips,  perhaps  I 
might  be  disappointed  in  that  too. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Nectar  !  nectar  !  That's  a  liquor 
there's  no  call  for  in  these  parts.  French,  I  suppose. 
"We  keep  no  French  wines  here,  sir. 

Marlow.     Of  true  English  growth,  I  assure  you. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Then  it's  odd  I  should  not  know 
it.  We  brew  all  sorts  of  wines  in  this  house,  and  I 
have  lived  here  these  eighteen  years. 

Marlow.  Eighteen  years  !  Why,  one  would  think, 
child,  you  kept  the  bar  before  you  were  born.  How 
old  are  you  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Oh,  sir,  I  must  not  tell  my  age. 
They  say  women  and  music  should  never  be  dated. 

Marlow.  To  guess  at  this  distance,  you  can't  be 
much  above  forty,  (Approaching.)  Yet  nearer,  I 
don't  think  so  much.  (Approaching.)  By  coming 
close  to  some  women,  they  look  younger  still ;  but  when 
we  come  very  close  indeed — (Attempting  to  kiss  her.) 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Pray,  sir,  keep  your  distance. 
One  would  think  you  wanted  to  know  one's  age  as 
they  do  horses,  by  mark  of  mouth. 

Marlow.  I  protest,  child,  you  use  me  extremely  ill. 
If  you  keep  me  at  this  distance,  how  is  it  possible  you 
and  I  can  ever  be  acquainted  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  And  who  wants  to  be  acquainted 
with  you  \    I  want  no  such  acquaintance,  not  I.    I'm 


306  SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

sure  you  did  not  treat  Miss  Hardcastle,  that  was  here 
a  while  ago,  in  this  obstopalous  manner.  I'll  warrant 
me,  before  her  you  looked  dashed,  and  kept  bowing  to 
the  ground,  and  talked,  for  all  the  world,  as  if  you 
were  before  a  justice  of  the  peace. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  Egad,  she  has  hit  it,  sure  enough ! 
{To  her.)  In  awe  of  her,  child?  Ha!  ha!  ha!  A 
mere  awkward,  squinting  thing  !  No,  no.  I  find  you 
don't  know  me.  I  laughed  and  rallied  her  a  little ; 
but  I  was  unwilling  to  be  too  severe.  No,  I  could  not 
be  too  severe,  curse  me  ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Oh,  then,  sir,  you  are  a  favorite, 
I  find,  among  the  ladies  ? 

Marlow.  Yes,  my  dear,  a  great  favorite.  And  yet, 
hang  me,  I  don't  see  what  they  find  in  me  to  follow. 
At  the  ladies'  club  in  town  I'm  called  their  agreeable 
Rattle.  Rattle,  child,  is  not  my  real  name,  but  one 
I'm  known  by.  My  name  is  Solomons ;  Mr.  Solomons, 
my  dear,  at  your  service.     {Offering  to  salute  her.) 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Hold,  sir,  you  are  introducing  me 
to  your  club,  not  to  yourself.  And  you're  so  great  a 
favorite  there,  you  say  ? 

Marlow.  Yes,  my  dear.  There's  Mrs.  Mantrap, 
Lady  Betty  Blackleg,  the  Countess  of  Sligo,  Mrs.  Lang- 
horns,  old  Miss  Biddy  Buckskin,  and  your  humble 
servant,  keep  up  the  spirit  of  the  place. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Then  it's  a  very  merry  place,  I 
suppose  ? 

Marlow.  Yes,  as  merry  as  cards,  suppers,  wine,  and 
old  women  can  make  us. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  And  their  agreeable  Rattle,  ha! 
ha !  ha ! 

Harlow.     {Aside.)     Egad!    I  don't  quite  like  this 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  307 

chit.  She  looks  knowing,  methinks.  You  laugh, 
child  ? 

Miss  Ilardcastle.  I  can't  but  laugh  to  think  what 
time  they  all  have  for  minding  their  work,  or  their 
family. 

Hm-iow.  (Aside.)  All  's  well ;  she  don't  laugh  at 
me.     {To  her.)    Do  you  ever  work,  child  ? 

Miss  Ilardcastle.  Aye,  sure.  There's  not  a  screen 
or  a  quilt  in  the  whole  house  but  what  can  bear  wit- 
ness to  that. 

Marlow.  Odso !  then  you  must  show  me  your  era- 
broidery.  I  embroider  and  draw  patterns  myself  a 
little.  If  you  want  a  judge  of  your  work,  you  must 
apply  to  me.     {Seising  her  hand.) 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Ay,  but  the  colors  don't  look 
well  by  candle-light.  You  shall  see  all  in  the  morn- 
ing.    {Struggling.) 

Harlow.  And  why  not  now,  my  angel?  Such 
beauty  fires  beyond  the  power  of  resistance.  Pshaw  ! 
the  father  here !  My  old  luck  ;  I  never  nicked  seven 
that  I  did  not  throw  ames  ace  three  times  following.* 

\_Exit  Harlow. 

Enter  Hardcastle  who  stands  in  surprise. 

Hardcastle.  So,  madam.  So  I  find  this  is  your 
modest  lover.  This  is  your  humble  admirer,  that  kept 
his  eyes  fixed  on  the  ground,  and  only  adored  at  hum- 
ble distance.  Kate,  Kate,  art  thou  not  ashamed  to 
deceive  your  father  so  ? 

*  Ames  ace,  or  ambs  ace,  is  two  aces  thrown  at  the  same  time 
on  two  dice.  As  seven  is  the  main,  to  throw  ames  ace  thrice 
running,  when  the  player  nicks,  that  is,  hazards  his  money  on 
seven,  ia  singularly  bad  luck. 


308  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Never  trust  me,  dear  papa,  but 
he's  still  the  modest  man  I  first  took  him  for ;  you'll 
be  convinced  of  it  as  well  as  I. 

Hardcastle.  By  the  hand  of  my  body,  I  believe  his 
impudence  is  infectious  !  Didn't  I  see  him  seize  your 
hand  ?  Didn't  I  see  him  hawl  you  about  like  a  milk- 
maid? And  now  you  talk  of  his  respect  and  his 
majesty,  forsooth  ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.  .  But  if  I  shortly  convince  you  of 
his  modesty,  that  he  has  only  the  faults  that  will  pass 
off  with  time,  and  the  virtues  that  will  improve  with 
age,  I  hope  you'll  forgive  him. 

Hardcastle.  The  girl  would  actually  make  one  run 
mad  !  I  tell  you  I'll  not  be  convinced.  I  am  convinced. 
He  has  scarcely  been  three  hours  in  the  house,  and  he 
has  already  encroached  on  all  my  prerogatives.  You 
may  like  his  impudence,  and  call  it  modesty  ;  but  my 
son-in-law,  madam,  must  have  very  different  qualifi- 
cations. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Sir,  I  ask  but  this  night  to  con- 
vince you. 

Hardcastle.  You  shall  not  have  half  the  time,  for 
I  have  thoughts  of  turning  him  out  this  very  hour. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Give  me  that  hour,  then,  and  I 
hope  to  satisfy  you. 

Hardcastle.  Well,  an  hour  let  it  be  then.  But  I'll 
have  no  trifling  with  your  father.  All  fair  and  open  ; 
do  you  mind  me  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  hope,  sir,  you  have  ever  found 
that  I  considered  your  commands  as  my  pride ;  for 
your  kindness  is  such,  that  my  duty  as  yet  has  been 
inclination. 

lExewnt. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  309 

ACT  FOURTH. 

Enter  Hastings  and  Miss  Neville. 

Hastings.  You  surprise  me ;  Sir  Charles  Marlow 
expected  here  this  night !  "Where  have  you  had  your 
information  ? 

Miss  Neville.  You  may  depend  upon  it.  I  just 
saw  his  letter  to  Mr.  Hardcastle,  in  which  he  tells  him 
he  intends  setting  out  in  a  few  hours  after  his  son. 

Hastings.  Then,  my  Constance,  all  must  be  com- 
pleted before  he  arrives.  He  knows  me  ;  and  should 
he  find  me  here,  would  discover  my  name,  and,  per- 
haps, ray  designs,  to  the  rest  of  the  family. 

Miss  Neville.     The  jewels,  I  hope,  are  safe  ? 

Hastings.  Yes,  yes.  I  have  sent  them  to  Marlow, 
who  keeps  the  keys  of  our  baggage.  In  the  mean  time, 
I'll  go  to  prepare  matters  for  our  elopement.  I  have 
had  the  Squire's  promise  of  a  fresh  pair  of  horses  ;  and 
if  I  should  not  see  him  again,  will  write  him  further 
directions.  \^Exit. 

Miss  Neville.  Well,  success  attend  you !  In  the 
mean  time,  I'll  go  amuse  my  aunt  with  the  old  pre- 
tence of  a  violent  passion  for  my  cousin.  {Exit. 

Enter  Marlow^  followed  hy  a  Servant. 

Marlow.  I  wonder  what  Hastings  could  mean  by 
sending  me  so  valuable  a  thing  as  a  casket  to  keep  for 
him,  when  he  knows  the  only  place  I  have  is  the  seat 
of  a  post-coach  at  an  inn-door.  Have  you  deposited 
the  casket  with  the  landlady,  as  I  ordered  you?  Have 
you  put  it  into  her  own  hands  ? 


810  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB. 

Servant.     Yes,  your  honor. 

Marlow.     She  said  she'd  keep  it  safe,  did  she  ? 

Servant.  Yes ;  she  said  she'd  keep  it  safe  enough. 
She  asked  me  how  I  came  by  it ;  and  she  said  she  had 
a  great  mind  to  make  me  give  an  account  of  myself. 

[^xit  Servant. 

Marlow.  Ha !  ha !  ha  !  They're  safe,  however. 
"What  an  unaccountable  set  of  beings  have  we  got 
amongst !  This  little  bar-maid,  though,  runs  in  my 
mind  most  strangely,  and  drives  out  the  absurdities  of 
all  the  rest  of  the  family.  She's  mine,  she  must  be 
mine,  or  I'm  greatly  mistaken. 

Enter  Hastings. 

Hastings.  Bless  me !  I  quite  forgot  to  tell  her  that 
I  intended  to  prepare  at  the  bottom  of  the  garden. 
Marlow  here,  and  in  spirits  too  ! 

Marlow.  Give  me  joy,  George !  Crown  me,  shadow 
me  with  laurels :  Well,  George,  after  all,  we  modest 
fellows  don't  want  for  success  among  the  women. 

Hastings.  Some  women,  you  mean.  But  what  suc- 
cess has  your  honor's  modesty  been  crowned  with  now, 
that  it  grows  so  insolent  upon  us  ? 

Marlow.  Didn't  you  see  the  tempting,  brisk,  lovely, 
little  thing,  that  runs  about  the  house  with  a  bunch  of 
keys  to  its  girdle  ? 

Hastings.     Well,  and  what  then  ? 

Marlow.  She's  mine,  you  rogue,  you.  Such  fire, 
such  motion,  such  eyes,  such  lips — but,  egad !  she  would 
not  let  me  kiss  them  though. 

Hastings.     But  are  you  so  sure,  so  very  sure  of  her  ? 

Marlow.  Why,  man,  she  talked  of  showing  me  her 
work  above  stairs,  and  1  am  to  approve  the  pattern. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  311 

Hastings.  But  how  can  you,  Charles,  go  about  to 
rob  a  woman  of  her  honor  ? 

Marlow.  Pshaw  !  pshaw  !  We  all  know  the  honor 
of  the  bar-maid  of  an  inn.  I  don't  intend  to  rob  her, 
take  my  word  for  it ;  there's  nothing  in  this  house  I 
shan't  honestly  pay  for. 

Hastings.     I  believe  the  girl  has  virtue. 

Marlow.  And  if  she  has,  I  should  be  the  last  man 
in  the  world  that  would  attempt  to  corrupt  it. 

Hastings.  You  have  taken  care,  I  hope,  of  the  cask- 
et I  send  you  to  lock  up  ?     It's  in  safety  ? 

Marlow.  Yes,  yes ;  it's  safe  enough,  I  have  taken 
care  of  it.  But  how  could  you  think  the  seat  of  a  post- 
coach  at  an  inn-door  a  place  of  safety  ?  Ah !  numscuU ! 
I  have  taken  better  precautions  for  you  than  you  did 
for  yourself — I  have — 

Hastings.     What  ? 

Marlow.  I  have  sent  it  to  the  landlady  to  keep  for 
you. 

Hastings.     To  the  landlady ! 

Marlov).     The  landlady. 

Hastings.     You  did  % 

Marlow.  I  did.  She's  to  be  answerable  for  its  forth- 
coming, you  know. 

Hastings.     Yes,  she'll  bring  it  forth  with  a  witness. 

Marlow.  Wasn't  I  right  ?  I  believe  you'll  allow 
that  I  acted  prudently  upon  this  occasion. 

Hastings.    {Aside.)    He  must  not  see  my  uneasiness. 

Marlow.  You  seem  a  little  disconcerted  though, 
methinks.     Sure  nothing  has  happened? 

Hastings.  No,  nothing.  Never  was  in  better  spirits 
in  all  my  life.  And  so  you  left  it  with  the  landlady, 
who,  no  doubt,  very  readily  undertook  the  charge. 


312  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Marlow.  Rather  too  readily ;  for  she  not  only  kept 
the  casket,  but,  through  her  great  precaution,  was  going 
to  keep  the  messenger  too.     Ha !  ha  !  ha ! 

Hastings.    He !  he !  he !    They're  safe,  however. 

Marlow.     As  a  guinea  in  a  miser's  purse. 

Hastings.  {Aside.)  So  now  all  hopes  of  fortune  are 
at  an  end,  and  we  must  set  off  without  it.  {To  him.) 
"Well,  Charles,  I'll  leave  you  to  your  meditations  on  the 
pretty  bar-maid,  and,  he !  he  !  he !  may  you  be  as  suc- 
cessful for  yourself  as  you  have  been  for  me !      [Meit. 

Marlow.  Thank  ye,  George ;  I  ask  no  more. — Ha  I 
ha!  ha! 

Enter  Hardcastle. 

Ha/rdcastle.  I  no  longer  know  my  own  house.  It's 
turned  all  topsy-turvy.  His  servants  have  got  drunk 
already.  I'll  bear  it  no  longer ;  and  yet,  from  my  re- 
spect for  his  father,  I'll  be  calm.  {To  him.)  Mr.  Mar- 
low, your  servant.  I'm  your  very  humble  servant. 
{Bowing  low.) 

Marlow.  Sir,  your  humble  servant.  {Aside.)  What 
is  to  be  the  wonder  now  ? 

Hardcastle.  I  believe,  sir,  you  must  be  sensible,  sir, 
that  no  man  alive  ought  to  be  more  welcome  than  your 
father's  son,  sir.     I  hope  you  think  so  ? 

Marlow.  I  do  from  my  soul,  sir.  I  don't  want  much 
entreaty.  I  generally  make  my  father's  son  welcome 
wherever  he  goes. 

Hardcastle.  I  believe  you  do,  from  my  soul,  sir. 
But  though  I  say  nothing  to  your  own  conduct,  that  of 
your  servants  is  insufferable.  Their  manner  of  drink- 
ing is  setting  a  very  bad  example  in  this  house,  I  assure 
you. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER,  313 

Harlow.  I  protest,  my  very  good  sir,  that  is  no  fault 
of  mine.  If  they  don't  drink  as  they  ought,  they  are 
to  blame.  I  ordered  them  not  to  spare  the  cellar.  I  did, 
I  assure  you.  {To  the  side-scene.)  Here,  let  one  of  my 
servants  come  up.  {To  him.)  My  positive  directions 
were,  that  as  1  did  not  drink  myself,  they  should  make 
up  for  my  deficiencies  below. 

Hardcastle.  Then  they  had  your  orders  for  what 
they  do  ?    I'm  satisfied  ! 

Marlow.  They  had,  I  assure  you.  You  shall  hear 
it  from  one  of  themselves. 

Enter  Servant,  drunk. 

Marlow.  You,  Jeremy  !  Come  forward,  sirrah  ! 
"What  were  my  orders  ?  Were  you  not  told  to  drink 
freely,  and  call  for  what  you  thought  fit,  for  the  good 
of  the  house  ? 

Hardcastle.     {Aside.)     I  begin  to  lose  my  patience. 

Jeremy.  Please  your  honor,  liberty  and  Fleet-street 
forever !  Though  I'm  but  a  servant,  I'm  as  good  as 
another  man.  I'll  drink  for  no  man  before  supper, 
sir,  damme !     Good  liquor  will  sit  upon  a  good  supper, 

but  a  good   supper  will  not  sit  upon hiccup 

my  conscience,  sir.  \_Exit. 

Marlow.  You  see  my  old  friend,  the  fellow  is  as 
drunk  as  he  can  possibly  be.  I  don't  know  what  you'd 
have  more,  unless  you'd  have  the  poor  devil  soused  in 
a  beer  barrel. 

Hardcastle.  Zounds,  he'll  drive  me  distracted,  if  I 
contain  myself  any  longer  !  Mr.  Marlow  ;  sir,  I  have 
submitted  to  your  insolence  for  more  than  four  hours, 
and  I  see  no  likelihood  of  its  coming  to  an  end.  I'm 
now  resolved  to  be  master  here,  sir,  and  1  desire  that 


314  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

you  and  your  drunken  pack  may  leave  my  house 
directly. 

Marlow.  Leave  your  house ! — Sure,  you  jest,  my 
good  friend  ?  What !  when  I  am  doing  what  I  can  to 
please  you. 

Hardcastle.  I  tell  you,  sir,  you  don't  please ;  so  I 
desire  you  will  leave  my  house. 

Marlow.  Sure  you  cannot  be  serious  ?  at  this  time 
of  night,  and  such  a  night?  You  only  mean  to  banter 
me. 

Hardcastle.  I  tell  you,  sir,  I'm  serious !  and  now 
that  my  passions  are  roused,  I  say  this  house  is  mine, 
and  I  command  you  to  leave  it  directly. 

Marlow.  Ha  !  ha  !  ha !  A  puddle  in  a  storm.  I 
shan't  stir  a  step,  I  assure  you.  {In  a  serious  tone.) 
This  your  house,  fellow  !  It's  my  house.  This  io  my 
house.  Mine  while  I  choose  to  stay.  "What  right  have 
you  to  bid  me  leave  this  house,  sir  ?  I  never  met  with 
such  impudence,  curse  me;  never  in  my  whole  life 
before. 

Hardcastle.  Nor  I,  confound  me  if  ever  I  did  !  To 
come  to  my  house,  to  call  for  what  he  likes,  to  turn  me 
out  of  my  own  chair,  to  insult  the  family,  to  order  his 
servants  to  get  drunk,  and  then  to  tell  me,  "This 
house  is  mine,  sir  !  "  By  all  that's  impudent,  it  makes 
me  laugh.  Ha  !  ha  !  ha  !  Pray,  sir,  (bantering)  as  you 
take  the  house,  what  think  you  of  taking  the  rest  of 
the  furniture?  There's  a  pair  of  silver  candlesticks, 
and  there's  a  fire-screen,  and  here's  a  pair  of  brazen- 
nosed  bellows ;  perhaps  you  may  take  a  fancy  to  them  ? 

Marlow.  Bring  me  your  bill,  sir ;  bring  me  your 
bill,  and  let's  make  no  more  words  about  it. 

Hardcastle.    There  are  a  set  of  prints,  too.     What 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  315 

think  you  of  the  Eake's  Progress  for  your  own  apart- 
ment ? 

Marlow.  Bring  me  your  bill,  I  say,  and  I'll  leave 
you  and  your  infernal  house  directly. 

Ha/rdcastle.  Then  there's  a  mahogany  table  that  you 
may  see  3^ our  face  in. 

Marlow.     My  bill,  I  say. 

Hardcastle.  I  had  forgot  the  great  chair  for  your 
own  particular  slumbers,  after  a  hearty  meal. 

Marlow.  Zounds  !  bring  me  my  bill,  I  say,  and  let's 
hear  no  more  on't. 

Hardcastle.  Young  man,  j^oung  man,  from  your 
father's  letter  to  me,  I  was  taught  to  expect  a  w^ell- 
bred,  modest  man  as  a  visitor  here,  but  now  I  find  him 
no  better  than  a  coxcomb  and  a  bully  !  but  he  will  be 
down  here  presently,  and  shall  hear  more  of  it.    {Exit. 

Marlow.  How's  this !  Sure  1  have  not  mistaken 
the  house.  Everything  looks  like  an  inn  ;  the  servants 
cry  coming ;  the  attendance  is  awkward  ;  the  bar-maid, 
too,  to  attend  us.  But  she's  here,  and  will  further  in- 
form me.     Whither  so  fast,  child  %     A  word  with  you. 

Enter  Miss  Hardcastle. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Let  it  be  short,  then.  I'm  in  a 
hurry.  {Aside.)  I  believe  he  begins  to  find  out  his 
mistake.     But  it's  too  soon  quite  to  undeceive  him. 

Marlow.  Pray,  child,  answer  me  one  question. 
What  are  you,  and  what  may  your  business  in  this 
house  be  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     A  relation  of  the  family,  sir. 

Marlovj.     What,  a  poor  relation? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Yes,  sir,  a  poor  relation,  appointed 
to  keep  the  keys,  and  to  see  that  the  guests  want  noth- 
ing  in  my  power  to  give  them. 

22— G  &  G— N 


316  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Marlow.     That  is,  you  act  as  the  bar-maid  of  this  inn. 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Inn !  O  la what  brought  that 

into  your  head  ?  One  of  the  best  families  in  the  county 
keep  an  inn  ! — Ha !  ha  !  ha  !  old  Mr.  Hardcastle's 
house  an  inn ! 

Marlow.  Mr.  Hardcastle's  house  ?  Is  this  Mr.  Hard- 
castle's house,  child ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Ay,  sure.  "Whose  else  should 
it  be? 

Marlow.  So,  then,  all's  out,  and  I  have  been  dam- 
nably imposed  upon.  Oh,  confound  my  stupid  head, 
I  shall  be  laughed  at  over  the  whole  town  !  I  shall 
be  stuck  up  in  caricature  in  all  the  print-shops.  The 
Dullissimo-Maccaroni.  To  mistake  this  house  of  all 
others  for  an  inn,  and  my  father's  old  friend  for  an  inn- 
keeper !  What  a  swaggering  puppy  must  he  take  me 
for  !  What  a  silly  puppy  do  I  find  myself  !  There, 
again,  may  I  be  hanged,  my  dear,  but  I  mistook  you 
for  tlie  bar-maid. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Dear  me !  dear  me !  I'm  sure 
there's  nothing  in  my  behavior  to  put  me  upon  a  level 
with  one  of  that  stamp. 

Marlovj.  Nothing,  my  dear,  nothing.  But  I  was  in 
for  a  list  of  blunders,  and  could  not  help  making  you 
a  subscriber.  My  stupidity  saw  everything  the  wrong 
way.  I  mistook  your  assiduity  for  assurance,  and  your 
simplicity  for  allurement.  But  it's  over — this  house 
I  no  more  show  my  face  in. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  hope,  sir,  I  have  done  nothing 
to  disoblige  you.  I'm  sure  I  should  be  sorry  to  affront 
any  gentleman  who  has  been  so  polite,  and  said  so  many 
civil  things  to  me.  I'm  sure  I  should  be  sorry  {pre- 
tending to  cry)  if  he  left  the  family  on  my  account. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  317 

I'm  sure  I  should  be  sorry  people  said  anything  amiss, 
since  1  have  no  fortune  but  my  character. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  By  Heaven!  she  weeps.  This 
is  the  first  mark  of  tenderness  I  ever  had  from  a  mod- 
est  woman,  and  it  touches  me.  {To  her.)  Excuse  me, 
my  lovely  girl ;  you  are  the  only  part  of  the  family  I 
leave  with  reluctance.  But,  to  be  plain  with  you,  the 
difference  of  our  birth,  fortune,  and  education,  make 
an  honorable  connection  impossible ;  and  I  can  never 
harbor  a  thought  of  seducing  simplicity  that  trusted  in 
my  honor,  of  bringing  ruin  upon  one  whose  only  fault 
was  being  too  lovely. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {Aside.)  Generous  man !  I  now 
begin  to  admire  him.  {To  him.)  But  I  am  sure  my 
family  is  as  good  as  Miss  Hardcastle's ;  and  though 
I'm  poor,  that's  no  great  misfortune  to  a  contented 
mind  ;  and  until  this  moment,  I  never  thought  that  it 
was  bad  to  want  fortune. 

MaHow.     And  why  now,  my  pretty  simplicity  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Because  it  puts  me  at  a  distance 
from  one,  that  if  I  had  a  thousand  pounds,  I  would 
give  it  all  to. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  This  simplicity  bewitches  me 
so,  that  if  I  stay,  I'm  undone.  I  must  make  one  bold 
effort  and  leave  her.  {To  her.)  Your  partiality  in  my 
favor,  my  dear,  touches  me  most  sensibly ;  and  were  I 
to  live  for  myself  alone,  I  could  easily  fix  my  choice. 
But  I  owe  too  much  to  the  opinion  of  the  world,  too 
much  to  the  authority  of  a  father;  so  that — I  can 
speak  it — it  affects  me. — Farewell.  [Exit. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  never  knew  half  his  merit  till 
now.  Tie  shall  not  go  if  I  have  power  or  art  to  detain 
him.     I'll  still  preserve  the  character  in  which  I  stooj?ed 


318  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

to  conquer,  but  will  undeceive  my  papa,  who,  perhaps, 
may  laugh  him  out  of  his  resolution.  [Exit. 

Miter  Tony  and  Miss  Neville. 

Tony.  Ay,  you  may  steal  for  yourselves  the  next 
time.  I  have  done  my  duty.  She  has  got  the  jewels 
again,  that's  a  sure  thing  ;  but  she  believes  it  was  all  a 
mistake  of  the  servants. 

Mi^s  Nemlle.  But,  ray  dear  cousin,  sure  you  won't 
forsake  us  in  this  distress  ?  If  she  in  the  least  suspects 
that  I  am  going  off,  I  shall  certainly  be  locked  up,  or 
sent  to  my  aunt  Pedigree's,  which  is  ten  times  worse. 

Tony.  To  be  sure,  aunts  of  all  kinds  are  damned 
bad  things.  But  what  can  I  do  ?  I  have  got  you  a 
pair  of  horses  that  will  fly  like  Whistle  Jacket ;  and 
I'm  sure  you  can't  say  but  I  have  courted  you  nicely 
before  ner  face.  Here  she  comes  ;  we  must  court  a  bit 
or  two  more,  for  fear  she  should  suspect  us. 

[They  retire  and  seein  to  fondle. 

Enter  Mrs.  Hardcastle. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Well,  I  was  greatly  fluttered,  to 
be  sure,  but  my  son  tells  me  it  was  all  a  mistake  of 
the  servants.  1  shan't  be  easy,  however,  till  they  are 
fairly  married,  and  then  let  her  keep  her  own  fortune. 
But  what  do  I  see  ?  fondling  together,  as  I'm  alive.  I 
never  saw  Tony  so  sprightly  before.  Ah !  have  I 
caught  you,  my  pretty  doves?  What,  billing,  ex- 
changing  glances,  and  broken  murmurs  ?     Ah  ! 

Tony.  As  for  murmurs,  mother,  we  grumble  a  little 
now  and  then,  to  be  sure ;  but  there's  no  love  lost  be- 
tween us. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  A  mere  sprinkling,  Tony,  upon 
the  flame,  only  to  make  it  burn  brighter. 

Miss  Nemlle.     Cousin  Tony  promises  us  to  give  us 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  319 

more  of  his  company  at  home.  Indeed,  he  shan't  leave 
us  any  more.     It  won't  leave  us,  cousin  Tony,  will  it  ? 

Tony.  Oh,  it's  a  pretty  creature.  No,  I'd  sooner 
leave  my  horse  in  a  pound,  than  leave  you  when  you 
smile  upon  one  so.    Your  laugh  makes  you  so  becoming. 

Miss  Neville.  Agreeable  cousin !  Who  can  help 
admiring  that  natural  humor,  that  pleasant,  broad,  red, 
thoughtless  {patting  his  cheek), — ah  !  it's  a  bold  face ! 

M7's.  Hardcastle.     Pretty  innocence. 

Tony.  I'm  sure  I  always  loved  cousin  Con's  hazel 
eyes,  and  her  pretty  long  fingers,  that  she  twists  this 
way  and  that  over  haspicholls,  like  a  parcel  of  bobbins. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Ah!  he  would  charm  the  bird 
from  the  tree.  I  was  never  so  happy  before.  My  boy 
takes  after  his  father,  poor  Mr.  Lumpkin,  exactly. 
The  jewels,  my  dear  Con,  shall  be  yours  incontinently. 
You  shall  have  them.  Isn't  he  a  sweet  boy,  my  dear. 
You  shall  be  married  to-morrow,  and  we'll  put  off  the 
rest  of  his  education,  like  Dr.  Drowsy's  sermons,  to  a 
fitter  opportunity. 

Enter  Diggory. 

Diggory.  Where's  the  Squire  ?  I  have  got  a  letter 
for  your  worship. 

Tony.  Give  it  to  my  mamma.  She  reads  all  my  let- 
ters first. 

Diggory.  I  had  orders  to  deliver  it  into  your  own 
hands. 

Tony.     Who  does  it  come  from  ? 

Diggory.  Your  worship  mun  ask  that  o'  the  letter 
itself. 

Tony.  I  could  wish  to  know  though.  {Turning  the 
letter,  and  gazing  on  it.) 


320  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Miss  Neville.  {Aside.)  Undone!  undone!  A  let- 
ter to  him  from  Hastings  :  I  know  the  hand.  If  my 
aunt  sees  it,  we  are  ruined  forever.  I'll  keep  her  em- 
ployed a  little,  if  I  can.  {To  Mrs.  Hardcastle.)  But 
I  have  not  told  you,  madam,  of  my  cousin's  smart 
answer  just  now  to  Mr.  Mario w.  We  so  laughed — 
you  must  know,  madam — This  way  a  little,  for  he 
must  not  hear  us.     {They  confer.) 

Tony.  {Still  gazing.)  A  damned  cramp  piece  of 
penmanship  as  ever  I  saw  in  my  life.  I  can  read  your 
print-hand  very  well ;  but  here  there  are  such  handles, 
and  shanks,  and  dashes  that  one  can  scarce  tell  the 
head  from  the  tail.  "  To  Anthony  Lumpkin,  Esquire.'' 
It's  very  odd,  I  can  read  the  outside  of  my  letters, 
where  my  own  name  is,  well  enough.  But  when  I 
come  to  open  it,  it's  all — buzz.  That's  hard — verj 
hard ;  for  the  inside  of  the  letter  is  always  the  cream 
of  the  correspondence. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Ha!  ha!  ha!  Yery  well,  very 
well.  And  so  my  son  was  too  hard  for  the  philoso- 
pher? 

Miss  Neville.  Yes,  madam  ;  but  you  must  hear  the 
rest,  madam.  A  little  more  this  way,  or  he  may  hear 
us.     You'll  hear  how  he  puzzled  him  again. 

Mr's.  Hardcastle.  He  seems  strangely  puzzled  now 
himself,  methinks. 

Tony.  {Still  gazing.)  A  damned  up-and-down  hand, 
as  if  it  was  disguised  in  liquor.  {Reading)  "  Dear 
Sir," — Ay,  that's  that.  Then  there's  an  M,  and  a  T, 
and  an  S,  but  whether  the  next  be  an  izzard  or  an  R, 
confound  me  I  cannot  tell. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  What's  that,  my  dear ;  can  I  give 
you  any  assistance  \ 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  321 

Miss  JVeville.  Pray,  aunt,  let  me  read  it.  Nobody- 
reads  a  cramp  hand  better  than  I.  {Twitching  the  letter 
from  him.)     Do  you  know  who  it  is  from  ? 

Tony.  Can't  tell,  except  from  Dick  Ginger,  the 
feeder. 

Miss  Neville.  Ay,  so  it  is  ;  {pretending  to  read)  Dear 
Squire,  hoping  that  you're  in  health,  as  I  am  at  this 
present.  The  gentlemen  of  the  Shake  Bag  Club  has 
cut  the  gentlemen  of  the  Goose  Green  quite  out  of 
feather.  The  odds — um — odd  battle — um — long — 
fighting — um — here,  here,  it's  all  about  cocks  and  fight- 
ing ;  it's  of  no  consequence — here,  put  it  up,  put  it  up. 
{Thrusting  the  crumpled  letter  upon  him,.) 

Tony.  But  I  tell  you,  miss,  it's  of  all  the  conse- 
quence in  the  world.  I  would  not  lose  the  rest  of  it 
for  a  guinea.  Here,  mother,  do  you  make  it  out.  Of 
no  consequence  !     \_Giving  Mrs.  Ilardcastle  the  letter. 

Mrs.  Ilardcastle.  How's  this  ?  {Beads)  "  Dear 
Squire,  I'm  now  waiting  for  Miss  Neville,  with  a  post- 
chaise  and  pair,  at  the  bottom  of  the  garden,  but  I 
find  my  horses  yet  unable  to  perform  the  journey.  I 
expect  you'll  assist  us  with  a  pair  of  fresh  horses,  as 
you  promised.  Despatch  is  necessary,  as  the  hag  " — 
ay,  the  hag — "  your  mother,  will  otherwise  suspect  us. 
Yours,  Hastings."  Grant  me  patience.  I  shall  run 
distracted  !     My  rage  chokes  me  ! 

Miss  Nemlle.  I  hope,  madam,  you'll  suspend  your 
resentment  for  a  few  moments,  and  not  impute  to  me 
any  impertinence,  or  sinister  design,  that  belongs  to 
another. 

Mrs.  Ilardcastle.  {Courtesy ing  very  low.)  Fine 
spoken  madam,3^ou  are  most  miraculously  polite  and  en- 
gaging, and  quite  the  very  pink  of  courtesy  and  circum- 


322  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

spection,  madam.  {Changing  her  tone.)  And  you,  you 
great  ill-fashioned  oaf,  with  scarce  sense  enough  to 
keep  your  mouth  shut, — were  you  too  joined  against 
me  ?  But  I'll  defeat  all  your  plots  in  a  moment.  As 
for  you,  madam,  since  you  have  got  a  pair  of  fresh 
horses  ready,  it  would  be  cruel  to  disappoint  them. 
So,  if  you  please,  instead  of  running  away  with  your 
spark,  prepare  this  very  moment  to  run  off  with  me. 
Your  old  aunt  Pedigree  will  keep  you  secure.  I'll 
warrant  me.  You  too,  sir,  may  mount  your  horse,  and 
guard  us  upon  the  way. — Here,  Thomas,  Eoger,  Dig- 
gory  ! — I'll  show  you  that  I  wish  you  better  than  you 
do  yourselves.  [JExit. 

Miss  Nemlle.     So,  now  I'm  completely  ruined. 

Tony.     Ay,  that's  a  sure  thing. 

Miss  Neville.  What  better  could  be  expected  from 
being  connected  with  such  a  stupid  fool,  and  after  all 
the  nods  and  signs  I  made  him. 

Tony.  By  the  laws,  miss,  it  was  your  own  clever, 
ness,  and  not  my  stupidity,  that  did  your  business! 
You  were  so  nice  and  so  busy  with  your  Shake  Bags 
and  Goose  Greens  that  I  thought  you  could  never  be 
making  believe. 

Enter  Hastings. 

Hastings.  So,  sir,  I  find  by  my  servant  that  you 
have  shown  my  letter,  and  betrayed  us.  Was  this  well 
done,  young  gentleman  ? 

Tony.  Here's  another.  Ask  miss,  there,  who  be- 
trayed you.     Ecod !  it  was  her  doing,  not  mine. 

Enter  Marlow. 
Marlow.     So,  I  have  been  finely  used  here  among 
you.     Rendered  contemptible,  driven  into  ill-manners, 
despised,  insulted,  laughed  at. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  323 

Tony.  Here's  another.  We  shall  have  all  Bedlam 
broke  loose  presently. 

Miss  Neville.  And  there,  sir,  is  the  gentleman  to 
whom  we  all  owe  every  obligation. 

Marlow.  What  can  I  say  to  him  ? — a  mere  boy, — 
an  idiot, — whose  ignorance  and  age  are  a  protection. 

Hastings.  A  poor,  contemptible  booby,  that  would 
but  disgrace  correction. 

Miss  Neville.  Yet  with  cunning  and  malice  enough 
to  make  himself  merry  with  all  our  embarrassments. 

Hastings.     An  insensible  cub. 

Marlow.     Replete  with  tricks  and  mischief. 

Tony.  Baw !  damme,  but  I'll  fight  you  both,  one 
after  the  other — with  baskets. 

Marlow.  As  for  him,  he's  below  resentment.  But 
your  conduct,  Mr.  Hastings,  requires  an  explanation. 
You  knew  of  my  mistakes,  yet  would  not  undeceive 
me. 

Hastings.  Tortured  as  I  am  with  my  own  disap- 
pointments, is  this  a  time  for  explanations  ?  It  is  not 
friendly,  Mr.  Marlow. 

Marlow.     But,  sir 

Miss  Neville.  Mr.  Marlow,  we  never  kept  on  your 
mistake,  till  it  was  too  late  to   undeceive  you.     Be 

pacified. 

Enter  Servant. 

Servant.  My  mistress  desires  you'll  get  ready  im- 
mediately, madam.  The  horses  are  putting-to.  Your 
hat  and  things  are  in  the  next  room.  We  are  to  go 
thirty  miles  before  morning.  [Exit  Servant. 

Miss  Neville.     Well,  well,  I'll  come  presently. 

Marlow.  {To  Hastings.)  Was  it  Aveil  done,  sir,  to 
assist  in  rendering  me  ridiculous  'i — To  hang  me  out 


824  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

for  the  scorn  of  all  my  acquaintance  ?  Depend  upon 
it,  sir,  I  shall  expect  an  explanation. 

Hastings.  Was  it  well  done,  sir,  if  you're  upon  that 
subject,  to  deliver  what  I  entrusted  to  yourself,  to  the 
care  of  another,  sir ! 

Miss  JVevtUe,  Mr.  Hastings  !  Mr.  Marlow  !  "Why 
will  you  increase  my  distress  by  this  groundless  dis- 
pute ?     I  implore — I  entreat  you 

Enter  Servant. 

Servant.  Your  cloak,  madam.  My  mistress  is  im- 
patient. [Exit  Servant. 

Miss  Neville.  I  come.  Pray,  be  pacified.  If  I 
leave  you  thus,  I  shall  die  with  apprehension. 

Enter  Servant. 

Servant.  Tour  fan,  muff,  and  gloves,  madam.  The 
horses  are  waiting.  \Exit  Servant. 

Miss  Neville.  Oh,  Mr.  Marlow,  if  you  knew  what 
a  scene  of  constraint  and  ill-nature  lies  before  me  I  am 
sure  it  would  convert  your  resentment  into  pity. 

Marlow.  I'm  so  distracted  with  a  variety  of 
passions  that  I  don't  know  what  I  do.  Forgive  me, 
madam.  George,  forgive  me.  You  know  my  hasty 
temper,  and  should  not  exasperate  it. 

Eastings.  The  torture  of  my  situation  is  my  only 
excuse. 

Miss  Neville.  "Well,  my  dear  Hastings,  if  you  have 
that  esteem  for  me  that  I  think, — that  I  am  sure  you 
have,  your  constancy  for  three  years  will  but  increase 
the  happiness  of  our  future  connection.     If 

Mrs.  Ilardcastle.  {Within.)  Miss  Neville  I  Con- 
stance, why,  Constance,  I  say. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB.  325 

Miss  Seville.  I'm  coming  !  Well,  constancy,  re- 
member, constancy  is  the  word.  [Mffit. 

Hastings.  My  heart !  how  can  I  support  this  ?  To 
be  so  near  happiness,  and  such  happiness  ! 

Marlow.  {To  Tony.)  You  see  now,  young  gentleman, 
the  effects  of  your  folly.  "What  might  be  amusement 
to  you,  is  here  disappointment,  and  even  distress. 

Tony.  {From  a  reverie.)  Ecod,  I  have  hit  it :  it's 
here !  Your  hands.  Yours,  and  yours,  my  poor  Sulky. 
My  boots  there,  ho ! — Meet  me,  two  hours  hence,  at 
the  bottom  of  the  garden ;  and  if  you  don't  find  Tony 
Lumpkin  a  more  good-natured  fellow  than  you  thought 
for,  I'll  give  you  leave  to  take  my  best  horse,  and  Bet 
Bouncer  into  the  bargain.     Come  along !  My  boots,  ho ! 

{^Exeunt. 


ACT  FIFTH. 
Enter  Hastings  and  Servant. 

Hastings.  You  saw  the  old  lady  and  Miss  Neville 
drive  off,  you  say  % 

Servant.  Yes,  your  honor.  They  went  off  in  a  post- 
coach,  and  the  young  Squire  went  on  horseback. 
They're  thirty  miles  off  by  this  time. 

Hastings.     Then  all  my  hopes  are  over  ? 

Servant.  Yes,  sir.  Old  Sir  Charles  is  arrived.  He 
and  the  old  gentleman  of  the  house  have  been  laugh- 
ing at  Mr.  Marlow's  mistake  this  half  hour.  They 
are  coming  this  way.  \_Exit. 

Hastings.  Then  I  must  not  be  seen.  So  now  to  my 
fruitless  appointment  at  the  bottom  of  the  garden. 
This  is  about  the  time.  [Exit. 


326  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUEB. 

Enter  Sir  Charles  Marlow  and  Hardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  Ha  !  ha !  ha !  The  peremptory  tone  in 
which  he  sent  forth  his  sublime  commands ! 

Sir  Charles.  And  the  reserve  with  which  I  suppose 
he  treated  all  your  advances. 

Hardcastle.  And  yet  he  might  have  seen  something 
in  me  above  a  common  innkeeper,  too. 

Sir  Charles,  Yes,  Dick,  but  he  mistook  you  for  an 
uncommon  innkeeper  ;  ha  !  ha  !  ha ! 

Hardcastle.  Well,  I  'm  in  too  good  spirits  to  think  of 
anything  but  joy.  Yes,  my  dear  friend,  this  union 
of  our  families  will  make  our  personal  friendships 
hereditary,  and  though  my  daughter's  fortune  is  but 
small 

Sir  Charles.  "Why,  Dick,  will  you  talk  of  fortune  to 
me  ?  My  son  is  possessed  of  more  than  a  competence 
already,  and  can  want  nothing  but  a  good  and  virtuous 
girl  to  share  his  happiness  and  increase  it.  If  they  like 
each  other,  as  you  say  they  do 

Hardcastle.  If,  man !  I  tell  you  they  do  like  each 
other.     My  daughter  as  good  as  told  me  so. 

Sir  Charles.  But  girls  are  apt  to  flatter  themselves, 
you  know. 

Hardcastle.  I  saw  him  grasp  her  hand  in  the 
warmest  manner,  myself  ;  and  here  he  comes  to  put  you 
out  of  your  ifs,  I  warrant  him. 

Enter  Marlow. 

Marlow.  I  come,  sir,  once  more,  to  ask  pardon  for 
my  strange  conduct.  I  can  scarce  reflect  on  my 
insolence  without  confusion. 

Hardcastle.  Tut,  boy,  a  trifle.  You  take  it  too 
gravely.     An  hour  or  two's  laughing  with  my  daughter, 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  327 

will  set  all  to  rights  again.  She'll  never  like  you  the 
worse  for  it. 

Marlow.  Sir,  I  shall  be  always  proud  of  her  approba- 
tion. 

Eardcastle.  Approbation  is  but  a  cold  word,  Mr. 
Marlow ;  if  I  am  not  deceived,  you  have  something 
more  than  approbation  thereabouts.     You  take  me ! 

Marlow.     Keally,  sir,  I  have  not  that  happiness. 

Hardcastle.  Come,  boy,  I'm  an  old  fellow,  and  know 
what's  what  as  well  as  you  that  are  younger.  1  know 
what  has  past  between  you ;  but  mum. 

Marlow.  Sure,  sir,  nothmg  has  past  between  us  but 
the  most  profound  respect  on  my  side,  and  the  most 
distant  reserve  on  hers.  You  don't  think,  sir,  that,  my 
impudence  has  been  past  upon  all  the  rest  of  the 
family. 

Hardcastle.  Impudence !  No,  I  don't  say  that — not 
quite  impudence — though  girls  like  to  be  played  with, 
and  rumpled  a  little,  too,  sometimes.  But  she  has 
told  no  tales,  I  assure  you. 

Marlow.     I  never  gave  her  the  slightest  cause. 

Hardcastle.  "Well,  well,  I  like  modesty  in  its  place 
well  enough  ;  but  this  is  over-acting,  young  gentleman. 
You  may  be  open.  Your  father  and  I  will  like  you  the 
better  for  it. 

Marlow.     May  I  die,  sir,  if  I  ever 

Hardcastle.  I  tell  you  she  don't  dislike  you ;  and  as 
I  am  sure  you  like  her 


Marlow.     Dear  sir,  I  protest,  sir- 


Hardcastle.     I  see  no  reason  why  you  should  not  be 
joined  as  fast  as  the  parson  can  tie  you. 

Marlow.     But  hear  me,  sir 

Hardcastle.     Your  father  approves  the  match,    I 


328  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

admire    it;    every    moment's    delay    will    be    doing 
mischief,  so 

Marlow.  But  why  don't  you  hear  me?  By  all 
that's  just  and  true,  I  never  gave  Miss  Hardcastle 
the  slightest  mark  of  my  attachment,  or  even  the  most 
distant  hint  to  susp'ect  me  of  affection.  We  had  but 
one  interview,  and  that  was  formal,  modest,  and  unin- 
teresting. 

Hardcastle.  {Aside.)  This  fellow's  formal,  modest 
impudence  is  beyond  bearing. 

Sir  Charles.  And  you  never  grasped  her  hand,  or 
made  any  protestations  ? 

Marlow.  As  Heaven  is  my  witness,  I  came  down 
in  obedience  to  your  commands ;  I  saw  the  lady  with- 
out emotion,  and  parted  without  reluctance.  I  hope 
you'll  exact  no  further  proofs  of  my  duty,  nor  prevent 
me  from  leaving  a  house  in  which  I  suffer  so  many 
mortifications.  \_Exit. 

Sir  Charles.  I'm  astonished  at  the  air  of  sincerity 
with  which  he  parted. 

Hardcastle.  And  I'm  astonished  at  the  deliberate 
intrepidity  of  his  assurance. 

Sir  Charles.  I  dare  pledge  my  life  and  honor  upon 
his  truth. 

Hardcastle.    Here  comes  my  daughter,  and  I  would 
stake  my  happiness  upon  her  veracity. 
Enter  Miss  Hardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  Kate,  come  hither,  child.  Answer  us 
sincerely,  and  without  reserve  :  has  Mr.  Marlow  made 
you  any  professions  of  love  and  affection  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  The  question  is  very  abrupt,  sir. 
But  since  you  require  unreserved  sincerity — I  think 
he  has. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  329 

Hardcastle.     {To  Sir  Charles.)    You  see. 

Sir  Charles.  And,  pray,  madam,  have  you  and  my 
son  had  more  than  one  intervew  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Yes,  sir,  several. 

Hardcastle.     {To  Sir  Charles^     You  see. 

Sdr  Charles.     But  did  he  profess  any  attachment  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     A  lasting  one. 

Sir  Charles.     Did  he  talk  of  love  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Much,  sir. 

Sir  Charles.     Amazing  !     And  all  this  formally  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.     Formally. 

Hardcastle.  Kow,  my  friend,  I  hope  you  are  satis- 
fied. 

Sir  Charles.     And  how  did  he  behave,  madam  ? 

Miss  Hardcastle.  As  most  professed  admirers  do ; 
said  some  civil  things  of  my  face  ;  talked  much  of  his 
want  of  merit,  and  the  greatness  of  mine  ;  mentioned 
his  heart,  gave  a  short  tragedy  speech,  and  ended  with 
pretended  rapture. 

Sir  Charles.  Now  I'm  perfectly  convinced,  indeed. 
I  know  his  conversation  among  women  to  be  modest 
and  submissive.  This  forward,  canting,  ranting  man- 
ner by  no  means  describes  him,  and,  I  am  confident, 
he  never  sat  for  the  picture. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Then  what,  sir,  if  I  should  con- 
vince you  to  your  face  of  my  sincerity  ?  If  you  and 
my  papa,  in  about  half  an  hour,  will  place  yourselves 
behind  that  screen,  you  shall  hear  him  declare  his  pas- 
sion to  me  in  person. 

Sir  Charles.  Agreed.  And  if  I  find  hira  what  you 
describe,  all  my  happiness  in  him  must  have  an  end. 


Miss  Hardcastle.     And  if  you  don't  find  him  what 


330  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

I  describe,  I  fear  my  happiness  must  never  have  a  be- 
ginning. 

SCENE  CHANGES  TO  THE  BACK  OF  THE  GARDEN. 

Miter  Hastings. 

Hastings.  What  an  idiot  am  I  to  wait  here  for  a 
fellow  who  probably  takes  a  delight  in  mortifying  me. 

He  never  intended  to  be  punctual,  and  I'll  wait  no 

longer.     What  do  I  see  ?     It  is  he !  and  perhaps  with 

news  of  my  Constance. 

Enter  Tony^  hooted  and  spattered. 

Hastings.  My  honest  Squire !  I  now  find  you  a 
man  of  your  word.     This  looks  like  friendship. 

Tony.  Ay,  I'm  your  friend,  and  the  best  friend  you 
have  in  the  world,  if  you  knew  but  all.  This  riding 
by  night,  by  the  by,  is  cursedly  tiresome.  It  has 
shook  me  worse  than  the  basket  of  a  stage-coach. 

Hastings.  But  how  ?  where  did  you  leave  your  fel- 
low-travellers ?    Are  they  in  safety  ?    Are  they  housed  ? 

Tony.  Five-and-twenty  miles  in  two  hours  and  a 
half  is  no  such  bad  driving.  The  poor  beasts  have 
smoked  for  it :  rabbit  me !  but  I'd  rather  ride  forty 
miles  after  a  fox,  than  ten  with  such  varmint. 

Hastings.  Well,  but  where  have  you  left  the  ladies? 
1  die  with  impatience. 

Tony.  Left  them !  Why,  where  should  I  leave 
them  but  where  I  found  them  ? 

Hastings.     This  is  a  riddle. 

Tony.  Riddle  me  this,  then.  What's  that  goes 
round  the  house,  and  round  the  house,  and  never 
touches  the  house  ? 

Hastings.     I'm  still  astray. 

Tony.     Why,   that's  it,   mun.      I  have  led  them 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  331 

astray.  By  jingo,  there's  not  a  pond  nor  a  slough 
within  five  miles  of  the  place  but  they  can  tell  the 
taste  of. 

Hastings.  Ha  !  ha  !  ha  !  I  understand  :  you  took 
them  in  a  round  while  they  supposed  themselves  going 
forward,  and  so  you  have  at  last  brought  them  home 
again. 

Tony.  You  shall  hear.  I  first  took  them  down 
Feather-bed  Lane,  where  we  stuck  fast  in  the  mud.  I 
then  rattled  them  crack  over  the  stones  of  Up-and- 
down  Hill.  I  then  introduced  them  to  the  gibbet  on 
Heavv-tree  Heath  :  and  from  that,  with  a  circura- 
bendibus,  I  fairly  lodged  them  in  the  horse-pond  at 
the  bottom  of  the  garden. 

Hastings.     But  no  accident,  I  hope  ? 

Tony.  No,  no ;  only  mother  is  confoundedly  fright- 
ened. She  thinks  herself  forty  miles  off.  She's  sick 
of  the  journey ;  and  the  cattle  can  scarce  crawl.  So, 
if  your  own  horses  be  ready,  you  may  whip  off  with 
cousin,  and  I'll  be  bound  that  no  soul  here  can  budge 
a  foot  to  follow  you. 

Hastings.     My  dear  friend,  how  can  I  be  grateful  ? 

Tony.  Ay,  now  it's  dear  friend !  noble  Squire ! 
Just  now,  it  was  all  idiot,  cub,  and  run  me  through 
the  guts.  Damn  your  way  of  fighting,  I  say.  After 
we  take  a  knock  in  this  part  of  the  country,  we  kiss 
and  be  friends.  But  if  you  had  run  me  through  the 
guts,  then  I  should  be  dead,  and  you  might  go  kiss  the 
hangman. 

Hastings.  The  rebuke  is  just.  But  1  must  hasten 
to  relieve  Miss  Neville :  if  you  keep  the  old  lady  em- 
ployed, I  promise  to  take  care  of  the  young  one. 

lExii  Hastings. 


832  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Tony.  Never  fear  me.  Here  she  comes ;  vanish. 
She's  got  from  the  pond,  and  draggled  up  to  the  waist 
like  a  mermaid. 

Enter  Mrs.  Hardcastle. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Oh,  Tony,  I'm  killed.  Shook! 
Battered  to  death!  I  shall  never  survive  it.  That 
last  jolt,  that  laid  us  against  the  quickset-hedge,  has 
done  my  business. 

Tony.  Alack,  mamma !  it  was  all  your  own  fault. 
You  would  be  for  running  away  by  night,  without 
knowing  one  inch  of  the  way. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  I  wish  we  were  at  home  again. 
I  never  met  so  many  accidents  in  so  short  a  journey. 
Drenched  in  the  mud,  overturned  in  a  ditch,  stuck  fast 
in  a  slough,  jolted  to  a  jelly,  and  at  last  to  lose  our 
way !     Whereabouts  do  you  think  we  are,  Tony  ? 

Tony.  By  my  guess,  we  should  be  upon  CrackskuU 
Common,  about  forty  miles  from  home. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  O  lud !  O  lud !  The  most  noto- 
rious spot  in  all  the  country.  We  only  want  a  rob- 
bery to  make  a  complete  night  on't. 

Tony.  Don't  be  afraid,  mamma;  don't  be  afraid. 
Two  of  the  five  that  kept  here  are  hanged,  and  the 
other  three  may  not  find  us.  Don't  be  afraid. — Is  that 
a  man  that's  galloping  behind  us.  No,  it's  only  a  tree. 
— Don't  be  afraid. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     The  fright  will  certainly  kill  me. 

Tony.  Do  you  see  anything  like  a  black  hat  moving 
behind  the  thicket  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     Oh,  death  ! 

Tony.  No;  it's  only  a  cow.  Don't  be  afraid, 
mamma,  don't  be  afraid. 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  333 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  As  I'm  alive,  Tony,  I  see  a  man 
coming  towards  us.  Ah,  I  am  sure  on't.  If  he  per- 
ceives us,  we  are  undone. 

Tony.  {Aside.)  Father-in-law,  by  all  that's  unlucky 
come  to  take  one  of  his  night  walks.  {To  her.)  Ah,  it's 
a  highwayman,  with  pistols  as  long  as  my  arm.  A 
damned  ill-looking  fellow ! 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Good  Heaven,  defend  us!  He 
approaches. 

Tony.  Do  you  hide  yourself  in  that  thicket,  and 
leave  me  to  manage  him.  If  there  be  any  danger,  I'll 
cough,  and  cry  hem.  When  I  cough,  be  sure  to  keep 
close.  \^Mrs.  Hardcastle  hides  behind  a  tree  in  the  hack 
scene. 

Enter  Hardcastle. 

Hardcastle.  I'm  mistaken,  or  I  heard  voices  of  peo- 
ple in  want  of  help.  Oh,  Tony,  is  that  you  ?  I  did 
not  expect  you  so  soon  back.  Are  your  mother  and 
her  charge  in  safety  ? 

Tony.     Very  safe,  sir,  at  my  aunt  Pedigree's.     Hem. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {From  behind.)  Ah,  death !  I 
find  there's  danger. 

Hardcastle.  Forty  miles  in  three  hours ;  sure  that's 
too  much,  my  youngster. 

Tony.  Stout  horses  and  willing  minds  make  short 
journeys,  as  they  say.     Hem. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {From  behind.)  Sure,  he'll  do  the 
dear  boy  no  harm. 

Hardcastle.  But  I  heard  a  voice  here ;  I  should  be 
glad  to  know  from  whence  it  came. 

Tony.  It  was  I,  sir,  talking  to  myself,  sir.  I  was 
saying  tliat  forty  miles  in  four  hours  was  very  good 
going.    Hem.     As  to  be  sure  it  was.     Hem.    I  have 


834  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

got  a  sort  of  cold  by  being  out  in  the  air.  "We'll  go 
in,  if  you  please.     Hem. 

Hardcastle.  But  if  you  talked  to  yourself,  you  did 
not  answer  yourself.  I'm  certain  I  heard  two  voices, 
and  am  resolved  {liaising  his  voice)  to  find  the  other  out. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {From  hehind.)  Oh !  he's  coming 
to  find  me  out.     Oh ! 

Tony.  What  need  you  go,  sir,  if  I  tell  you  ?  Hem. 
I'll  lay  down  my  life  for  the  truth — hem — I'll  tell  you 
all,  sir.  [Detaining  him. 

Hardcastle.  I  tell  you  I  will  not  be  detained.  I 
insist  on  seeing.     It's  in  vain  to  expect  I'll  believe  you. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {Running  forward  from  hehind^ 
O  lud  !  he'll  murder  my  poor  boy,  my  darling  !  Here, 
good  gentleman,  whet  your  rage  upon  me.  Take  my 
money,  my  life,  but  spare  that  young  gentleman ;  spare 
my  child  if  you  have  any  mercy. 

Hardcastle.  My  wife,  as  I'm  a  Christian.  From 
whence  can  she  have  come  ?  or  what  does  she  mean  % 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {Kneeling.)  Take  compassion  on 
us,  good  Mr.  Highwayman.  Take  our  money,  our 
watches,  all  we  have,  but  spare  our  lives.  "We  will 
never  bring  you  to  justice ;  indeed  we  won't,  good  Mr. 
Highwayman. 

Hardcastle.  I  believe  the  woman's  out  of  her  senses. 
What,  Dorothy,  don't  you  know  me  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Mr.  Hardcastle,  as  I'm  alive ! 
My  fears  blinded  me.  But  who,  my  dear,  could  have 
expected  to  meet  you  here,  in  this  frightful  place,  so 
far  from  home  ?     What  has  brought  you  to  follow  us  ? 

Hardcastle.  Sure,  Dorothy,  you  have  not  lost  your 
wits  ?  So  far  from  home,  when  you  are  within  forty 
yards  of  your  own  door !     {To  him.)    This  is  one  of 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  335 

your  old  tricks,  your  graceless  rogue,  you.  (To  he?'.) 
Don't  you  know  the  gate  and  the  mulberry  tree  ?  and 
don't  you  remember  the  horse-pond,  my  dear  ? 

Mrs.  Uardcastle.  Yes,  I  shall  remember  the  horse- 
pond  as  long  as  I  live ;  I  have  caught  my  death  in  it. 
{To  Tony.)  And  is  it  to  you,  you  graceless  varlet,  I  owe 
all  this  ?     I'll  teach  you  to  abuse  your  mother — I  will. 

Tony.  Ecod,  mother,  all  the  parish  says  you  have 
spoiled  me,  and  so  you  ma}'"  take  the  fruits  on't. 

Mi's.  Uardcastle.     I'll  spoil  you,  1  will. 

[^Follows  him  off  the  stage. 

Hardcastle.     There's  morality,  however,  in  his  reply. 

[Exit. 
Enter  Hastings  and  Miss  Neville. 

Hastings.  My  dear  Constance,  why  will  you  delib- 
erate thus  ?  If  we  delay  a  moment,  all  is  lost  forever. 
Pluck  up  a  little  resolution,  and  we  shall  soon  be  out 
of  the  reach  of  her  malignity. 

Miss  Neville.  I  find  it  impossible.  My  spirits  are 
so  sunk  with  the  agitations  I  have  suffered,  that  I  am 
unable  to  face  any  t].q\y  danger.  Two  or  three  years' 
patience  will  at  last  crown  us  with  happiness. 

Hastings.  Such  a  tedious  delay  is  worse  than  incon- 
stancy. Let  us  fly,  my  charmer !  Let  us  date  our 
happiness  from  this  very  moment.  Perish  fortune, 
Love  and  content  will  increase  what  we  possess  beyond 
a  monarch's  revenue.     Let  me  prevail ! 

Miss  Neville.  No,  Mr.  Hastings,  no.  Prudence  once 
more  comes  to  my  relief,  and  I  will  obey  its  dictates. 
In  the  moment  of  passion,  fortune  may  be  despised,  but 
it  ever  produces  a  lasting  repentance.  I'm  resolved  to 
ap]ily  to  Mr.  Hardcastle's  compassion  and  justice  for 
redress. 


336  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Hastings.  But  though  he  had  the  will,  he  has  not 
the  power,  to  relieve  you. 

Miss  JVeville.  But  he  has  influence,  and  upon  that  I 
am  resolved  to  rely. 

Hastings.  I  have  no  hopes.  But,  since  you  persist 
I  must  reluctantly  obey  you.  [Mceunt. 

SCENE  CHANGES. 

Enter  Sir  Charles  Marlow  and  Miss  Hardcastle. 

Sir  Charles.  "What  a  situation  am  I  in !  If  what 
you  say  appears,  I  shall  then  find  a  guilty  son.  If 
what  he  says  be  true,  I  shall  then  lose  one  that,  of  all 
others,  I  most  wished  for  a  daughter. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  I  am  proud  of  your  approbation ; 
and  to  show  I  merit  it,  if  you  place  yourselves  as  I 
directed,  you  shall  hear  his  explicit  declaration.  But 
he  comes. 

Sir  Charles.  I'll  to  your  father,  and  keep  him  to 
the  appointment.  \_Hxit  Sir  Charles. 

Enter  Marlow. 

Marlow.  Though  prepared  for  setting  out,  I  come 
once  more  to  take  leave  :  nor  did  I  till  this  moment 
know  the  pain  I  feel  in  the  separation. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  {In  her  own  natural  manner.)  I 
believe  these  sufferings  cannot  be  very  great,  sir,  which 
you  can  so  easily  remove.  A  day  or  two  longer,  per- 
haps, might  lessen  your  uneasiness,  by  showing  the 
little  value  of  what  you  now  think  proper  to  regret. 

Marlow.  {Aside.)  This  girl  every  moment  improves 
upon  me.  {To  her.)  It  must  not  be,  madam  ;  I  have 
already  trifled  too  long  with  my  heart.  My  very  pride 
begins    to  submit   to    my  passion.      The    disparity 


SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  337 

of  education  and  fortune,  the  anger  of  a  parent,  and 
the  contempt  of  my  equals,  begin  to  lose  their  weight : 
and  nothing  can  restore  me  to  myself  but  this  painful 
effort  of  resolution. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Then  go,  sir ;  I'll  urge  nothing 
more  to  detain  you.  Though  my  family  be  as  good  as 
hers  you  came  down  to  visit,  and  my  education,  I  hope, 
not  inferior,  what  are  these  advantages  without  equal 
affluence  ?  I  must  remain  contented  with  the  slight 
approbation  of  imputed  merit  ;  I  must  have  only  the 
mockery  of  your  addresses,  while  all  your  serious  aims 
are  fixed  on  fortune. 

Enter  Hardcastle  and  Sir  Charles  Marlow,  from  hehind. 

Sir  Charles.     Here,  behind  this  screen. 
Hardcastle.     Ay,  ay  ;  make  no  noise.     I'll  engage 
my  Kate  covers  him  with  confusion  at  last. 

Marloio.  By  heaven  !  madam,  fortune  was  ever 
my  smallest  consideration.  Your  beauty  at  first  caught 
my  eye  ;  for  who  could  see  that  without  emotion  ? 
But  every  moment  that  I  converse  with  you,  steals  in 
some  new  grace,  heightens  the  picture,  and  gives  it 
stronger  expression.  What  at  first  seemed  rustic  plain- 
ness, now  appears  refined  simplicity.  What  seemed 
forward  assurance,  now  strikes  me  as  the  results  of 
courageous  innocence  and  conscious  virtue. 

Sir  Charles.     What  can  it  mean  ?     He  amazes  me  ? 

Hardcastle.     I  told  you  how  it  would  be.     Hush  ! 

Marlow.  I  am  now  determined  to  stay,  madam,  and 
I  have  too  good  an  opinion  of  my  father's  discern- 
ment,  when  he  sees  you,  to  doubt  his  approbation. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  No,  Mr.  Marlow,  I  will  not,  can- 
not detain  you.     Do  you  think  I  could  suffer  a  connec* 


338  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

tion  in  which  there  is  the  smallest  room  for  repent- 
ance ?  Do  you  think  I  would  take  the  mean  advantage 
of  a  transient  passion  to  load  you  with  confusion  ? 
Do  you  think  I  could  ever  relish  that  happiness  .vhich 
was  acquired  by  lessening  yours  ? 

Marlow.  By  all  that's  good,  I  can  have  no  happi- 
ness but  what's  in  your  power  to  grant  me  !  Nor  shall 
I  ever  feel  repentance  but  in  not  having  seen  your 
merits  before.  I  will  stay  even  contrary  to  your 
wishes  ;  and  though  you  should  persist  to  shun  me,  1 
will  make  my  respectful  assiduities  atone  for  the  levity 
of  my  past  conduct. 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Sir,  I  must  entreat  you'll  desist. 
As  our  acquaintance  began,  so  let  it  end,  in  indiffer- 
ence. I  might  have  given  an  hour  or  two  to  levity  ;  but 
seriously,  Mr.  Marlow,  do  you  think  I  could  ever  submit 
to  a  connection  where  I  must  appear  mercenary,  and 
you  imprudent  ?  Do  you  think  I  could  ever  catch  at 
the  confident  addresses  of  a  secure  admirer. 

Marlow.  {Kneeling.)  Does  this  look  like  security  ! 
Does  this  look  like  confidence  ?  No,  madam,  every 
moment  that  shows  me  your  merit,  only  serves  to  in- 
crease my  diffidence  and  confusion.  Here  let  me  con- 
tinue— 

Sir  Charles.  1  can  hold  it  no  longer.  Charles, 
Charles,  how  hast  thou  deceived  me !  Is  this  your 
indifference,  your  uninteresting  conversation  ? 

Hardcastle.  Your  cold  contempt :  your  formal  in- 
terview !     What  have  you  to  say  now  ? 

Marlow.  That  I'm  all  amazement !  "What  can  it 
mean  ? 

Ha/rdcastle.  It  means  that  you  can  say  and  unsay 
things  at  pleasure  :  that  you  can  address  a  lady  in  pri- 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER.  339 

vate,  and  deny  it  in  public ;  that  you  have  one  story 
for  us,  and  another  for  my  daughter. 

Marlow.    Daughter  ! — This  lady  your  daughter  ? 

Hardcastle.  Yes,  sir,  my  only  daughter — my  Kate  ; 
whose  else  should  she  be  ? 

Marlow.     Oh,  the  devil ! 

Miss  Hardcastle.  Yes,  sir,  that  very  identical  tall, 
squinting  lady  you  were  pleased  to  take  me  for  (courtesy- 
mg) ;  she  that  you  addressed  as  the  mild,  modest,  senti- 
mental man  of  gravity,  and  the  bold,  forward,  agree- 
able Kattle  of  the  ladies'  club.     Ha  !  ha  !  ha  ! 

Marlow.  Zounds,  there's  no  bearing  this ;  it's  worse 
than  death  ! 

Miss  Hardcastle  In  which  of  your  characters,  sir, 
will  you  give  us  leave  to  address  you  ?  As  the  falter- 
ing gentleman  which  looks  on  the  ground,  that  speaks, 
just  to  be  heard,  and  hates  hypocrisy  ;  or  the  loud, 
confident  creature,  that  keeps  it  up  with  Mrs.  Mantrap, 
and  old  Miss  Biddv  Buckskin,  till  three  in  the  morn- 
ing  ! — Ila !  ha  !  ha ! 

Marlow.  Oh,  curse  on  my  noisy  head  !  I  never 
attempted  to  be  impudent  yet  that  1  was  not  taken 
down.     I  must  be  gone. 

Hardcastle.  By  the  hand  of  my  body,  but  3^ou  shall 
not.  I  see  it  was  all  a  mistake,  and  I  am  rejoiced  to 
find  it.  You  shall  not  stir,  1  tell  you.  1  know  she'll 
forgive  you.  Won't  you  forgive  him,  Kate  ?  We'll 
all  forgive  you.     Take  courage,  man. 

{They  retire,  she  tormenting  him  to  the  hack  scene. 

Enter  Mrs.  Hardcastle  and  Tony. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  So,  so,  they're  gone  off.  Let 
them  go,  1  care  not. 

22— a  &  G— o 


340  SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

Hardcastle.     Who  gone  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  My  dutiful  niece  and  her  gentle, 
man,  Mr.  Hastings,  from  town.  He  who  came  down 
"with  our  modest  visitor  here. 

Sir  Charles.  Who,  my  honest  George  Hastings? 
As  worthy  a  fellow  as  lives,  and  the  girl  could  not 
have  made  a  more  prudent  choice. 

Hardcastle.  Then,  by  the  hand  of  my  body,  I'm 
proud  of  the  connection, 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Well,  if  he  has  taken  away  the 
lady,  he  has  not  taken  her  fortune ;  that  remains  in 
this  family  to  console  us  for  her  loss. 

Hardcastle.  Sure,  Dorothy,  you  would  not  be  so 
mercenary  ? 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.     Ay,  that's  my  affair,  not  yours. 

Hardcastle.  But  you  know  if  your  son,  when  of 
age,  refuses  to  marry  his  cousin,  her  whole  fortune  is 
then  at  her  own  disposal. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  Ay,  but  he's  not  of  age,  and  she 
has  not  thought  proper  to  wait  for  his  refusal. 

Enter  Hastings  and  Miss  Neville. 

Mrs.  Hardcastle.  {Aside.)  What,  returned  so  soon. 
I  begin  not  to  like  it. 

Hastings.  {To  Hardcastle.)  For  my  late  attempt 
to  fly  off  with  your  niece,  let  my  present  confusion  be 
my  punishment.  We  are  now  come  back,  to  appeal 
from  your  justice  to  your  humanity.  By  her  father's 
consent  1  first  paid  her  my  addresses,  and  our  passions 
were  first  founded  in  duty. 

Miss  Neville.  Since  his  death,  I  have  been  obliged 
to  stoop  to  dissimulation  to  avoid  oppression.  In  an 
hour  of  levity,  I  was  ready  even  to  give  up  my  fortune 


SEE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER,  341 

to  secure  my  choice :  But  I  am  now  recovered  from 
the  delusion,  and  hope,  from  your  tenderness,  what  is 
denied  me  from  a  nearer  connection. 

Mrs.  Eardcastle.  Pshaw !  pshaw ;  this  is  all  but 
the  whining  end  of  a  modern  novel. 

Eardcastle.  Be  it  what  it  will,  I'm  glad  they're 
come  back  to  reclaim  their  due.  Come  hither,  Tony, 
boy.  Do  you  refuse  this  lady's  hand,  whom  1  now 
offer  you  ? 

Tony.  What  signifies  my  refusing  ?  You  know  I 
can't  refuse  her  till  I'm  of  age,  father. 

Eardcastle.  While  I  thought  concealing  your  age, 
boy,  was  likely  to  conduce  to  your  improvement,  I 
concurred  with  your  mother's  desire  to  keep  it  secret. 
But  since  I  find  she  turns  it  to  a  wrong  use,  I  must 
now  declare  you  have  been  of  age  these  three  months. 

Tony.     Of  age  !     Am  I  of  age,  father  ? 

Eardcastle.     Above  three  months. 

Tony.  Then  you'll  see  the  first  use  I'll  make  o^ 
my  liberty.  {Taking  Miss  Neville's  hand.)  Witness 
all  men,  by  these  presents,  that  I,  Anthony  Lumpkin, 
esquire,  of  blank  place,  refuse  you,  Constantia  Neville, 
spinster,  of  no  place  at  all,  for  my  true  and  lawful 
wife.  So  Constance  Neville  may  marry  whom  she 
pleases,  and  Tony  Lumpkin  is  his  owm  man  again. 

Sir  Charles.     O  brave  Squire  ! 

Eastings.     My  worthy  friend! 

Mrs.  Eardcastle.     My  undutiful  offspring  ! 

Marlow.  Joy,  my  dear  George,  I  give  you  joy  sin- 
cerely !  And,  could  I  prevail  upon  my  little  tyrant 
here  to  be  less  arbitrary,  I  should  be  the  happiest  man 
alive,  if  you  would  return  me  the  favor. 

Eastings.    {To  Miss  Eardcastle.)  Come,  madam,  you 


342  SHE  STOOPS  TO  CONQUER. 

are  now  driven  to  the  very  last  scene  of  all  your  con- 
trivances. I  know  you  like  him,  I'm  sure  he  loves  you, 
and  3'ou  must  and  shall  have  him. 

Hardcastle.  {Joining  their  hands.)  And  I  say  so, 
too.  And,  Mr.  Marlow,  if  she  makes  as  good  a  wife 
as  she  has  a  daughter,  I  don't  believe  you'll  ever  re- 
pent your  bargain.  So  now  to  supper.  To-morrow 
we  shall  gather  all  the  poor  of  the  parish  about  us, 
and  the  mistakes  of  the  night  shall  be  crowned  with  a 
merry  morning.  So,  boy,  take  her ;  and  as  you  have 
been  mistaken  in  the  mistress,  my  wish  is,  that  you 
may  never  be  mistaken  in  the  wife.      [^Exeunt  Oranes. 


CONTENTS. 


PAOB 

Introduction 77. 1 

Life  and  Writings  op  Gray 17 

Poems  : — 

I.  Ode  on  the  Spring 67 

II.  Ode  on  the  Death  of  a  Favorite  Cat 70 

III.  Ode  on  a  Distant  Prospect  of  Eton  College. . .  72 

IV.  Hymn  to  Adversity 77 

V.  The  Progress  of  Poesy 80 

VI.  The  Bard 89 

VII.  The  Fatal  Sisters 101 

VIII.  The  Descent  of  Odin 106 

IX.  The  Triumphs  of  Owen Ill 

X.  Elegy  Written  in  a  Country  Churchyard...  113 

XI.  A  Long  Story 120 

XII.  Ode  for  Music  at  the  Installation 128 

Posthumous  Poems  :— 

XIII.  Agrippina 133 

XIV.  Sonnet  on  the  Death  of  Richard  West 145 

XV.  Hymn  to  Ignorance 146 

XVI.  The  Alliance  of  Education  and  Government.  148 

iii 


iv  CONTENTS. 

Poems— 

PAaB 

XVII.  Stanzas  to  Mr.  Bentley 156 

XVIII.  Ode  on  the  Pleasure  arising  from  Vicis- 
situde   158 

XIX.  Epitaph  on  Mrs.  Clarke 161 

XX.  Epitaph  on  a  Child 162 

XXI.  Gray  on  Himself 163 

XXII.  Epitaph  on  Sir  William  Williams 163 

XXIII.  The  Death  of  Hoel 164 

XXIV.  Caradoc 165 

XXV.  Conan 165 

XXVI.  The  Candidate 166 

XXVII.  Verses  from  Shakespeare 168 

XXVIII.  Impromptu,  suggested  by  Ruins  at  Kings- 
gate  170 

XXIX.  Satire  on  the  Heads  of  Houses 172 

XXX.  Amatory  Lines 174 

XXXI.  Song 175 

XXXII.  Epitaph  on  Mrs.  Mason 175 

XXXIII.  Tophet 176 

XXXIV.  Comic  Lines 176 

XXXV.  Impromptus 177 

Doubtful  Poems  : — 

I.  Ode ::Tr:~r.. iso 

II.  Poetical  Rondeau 182 

III.  The  Characters  of  the  Christ-Cross  Row. .  184 

Translations  :— 

I.  From  Statius 188 

II.  From  Tasso 192 

III.  Imitated  from  Propertius 196 

IV.  To  Msecenas 200 

V.  Translation  from  Dante 205 


CONTENTS.  V 

Latin  Poems  and  Verses  :— 

PAGE 

I.  Play-Exercise  at  Eton 211 

II.  In  D.  29am.  Mail 215 

III.  In  5tam.  Novembris 21G 

IV.  "  Gratia  magna  tuae  fraudi  " 218 

V.  "  Oh  !  nimium  felix  !  " 221 

VI.  '*  Vah,  tenero  quodcunque  potest " 222 

VII.  Paraphrase  of  Psalm  Ixxxiv 224 

VIII.  Hymeneal 226 

IX.  Luna  Habitabilis 230 

X.  Ad  C.  Favonium  Aristium 235 

XI.  Alcaic  Fragment 238 

XII.  Sapphics 238 

XIII.  Elegiacs 239 

XIV.  Ad  C.  Favonium  Zephyrinum 239 

XV.  Fragment  on  the  Gaurus 241 

XVI.  A  Farewell  to  Florence 244 

XVII.  Imitation  of  an  Italian  Sonnet 245 

XVIII.  Alcaic  Ode 246 

XIX.  Sophonisba  Ad  Masinissam 247 

XX.  De  Principiis  Cogitandi 250 

XXI.  "  Oh  ubi  coUes  " 264 

XXII.  From  Petrarch 264 

XXIII.  From  the  Anthologia  Graeca 265 

XXIV.  Generic  Characters  of  the  Orders  of  Insects.  272 

Notes 277 

Explanation  op  the  Prints  in  Bentley's  "  De- 
signs"   420 

Appendix ^^^ 


THOMAS   GRAY 


O  English  poet  has  a  greater  reputation  on  a 
smaller  body  of  verse  than  Gray;  to  the  great 
majority  of  readers  he  is  the  author  of  one 
poem.  That  poem  has  had  the  rare  good  for- 
tune to  captivate  the  most  fastidious,  and  to  secure  a  lodg- 
ment in  what  may  be  called  "the  popular  memory."  Few 
poems  have  been  studied  more  critically  for  its  exquisite  dic- 
tion than  the  "Elegy  Written  in  a  Country  Church-yard," 
and  few  have  contributed  so  many  phrases  to  the  world's 
capital  of  apt  and  striking  quotations.  The  rare  good  for- 
tune of  pleasing  both  the  few  and  the  many  is  explained  by 
the  fact  that  Gray  had  genius  and  a  fastidious  taste  in  al- 
most equal  proportions;  he  united  the  freshness  and  force 
of  original  ability  with  the  delicate  skill  of  the  trained 
artist. 

Born  in  London,  December  26,  1716,  he  inherited  from 
a  father  who  had  little  practical  ability  a  deep  love  of  music. 
He  studied  both  at  Eton  College  and  at  Cambridge  Univer- 
sity;  accompanied  Horace  Walpole  on  his  travels  in  Europe; 
returned  to  Cambridge  and  spent  his  life  in  study,  medita- 
tion and  writing.  The  residence  of  his  mother  near  the  lit- 
tle hamlet  of  Stoke-Pogis,  a  few  miles  from  Windsor  Cas- 


2  THOMAS     GRAY 

tie,  took  him  to  the  Httle  church-yard  in  which  a  part  of  the 
"Elegy"  is  believed  to  have  been  written,  and  in  which  he 
was  buried  July  24,  1771. 

He  was  a  slow  and  fastidious  writer,  and  his  work  is 
very  small  in  bulk;  it  is,  however,  of  high  importance. 
Matthew  Arnold  has  well  said  that  being  of  a  sensitive  and 
poetic  mind  in  a  prosaic  age.  Gray  "never  spoke  out." 

He  wrote  little,  but  everything  he  wrote  shows  a  vigor- 
ous and  sensitive  hand,  and  bears  the  stamp  of  a  deeply 
meditative  spirit.  The  "Elegy"  is  not  only  the  most  widely 
read  of  his  works,  but  is  one  of  the  most  characteristic  poems 
in  English  literature  by  reason  of  its  striking  power  of  im- 
parting to  reflections  on  time-worn  themes  a  high  degree  of 
poetic  suggestion.  The  "Ode  on  a  Distant  Prospect  of  Eton 
College,"  "The  Progress  of  Poesy"  and  "The  Bard,"  while 
not  strikingly  original  in  thought,  show  depth  of  emotion 
and  abound  in  passages  which  are  at  once  so  clear  in  out- 
line and  so  striking  in  imagery  that  they  take  possession  of 
the  memory.     Such  phrases  as 


"  Thoughts  that  breathe,  and  words  that  burn," 
"  Youth  at  the  prow,  and  Pleasure  at  the  helm," 
"  The  short  and  simple  annals  of  the  poor," 


Stand  in  no  need  of  interpretation ;  their  faculty  of  fastening 
themselves  in  the  memory  explains  itself. 

A  man  of  reticent  manners,  shy,  studious  and  a  semi-in- 
valid, Gray  was  a  scholar  of  large  acquirements ;  at  home  in 
literature,  philosophy,  history,  art,  music  and  many  kindred 
studies.  He  declined  the  position  of  Poet  Laureate,  and  al- 
though at  the  end  of  his  life  he  held  an  important  professor- 
ship at  Cambridge,  he  was  a  student,  not  a  teacher.     Of  a 


THOMAS    GRAY  3 

profoundly  serious  nature,  with  the  habit  of  meditation,  he 
had  the  gift  of  humor  and  was  even  sportive  at  times.  He 
had  also  a  rich  fund  of  sentiment  and  a  feeling  for  nature 
which  made  him  the  forerunner  of  Burns  and  Wordsworth. 
His  style  is  best  described  by  his  own  definition  of  his  aims : 
"extreme  conciseness  of  expression,  yet  pure,  perspicuous 
and  musical." 

Hamilton  W.  Mabie. 


THE 
LIFE  AND  WEITINGS  OP  GRAY. 

1716-1771. 

Thomas  Gbay  was  the  fifth  child  of  Philip 
Gray,  a  scrivener  or  broker  in  London.  His 
mother  was  a  Miss  Dorothy  Antrobus,  who,  at 
the  time  of  her  marriage,  kept  a  milliner's  shop 
in  partnership  with  her  sister  Mary,  in  Corn- 
hill  ;  and  here  Thomas  was  born  on  the  26th 
December,  1716. 

He  was  one  of  twelve  children,  but  all  the 
others  died  in  their  infancy  or  childhood.  "  I 
have  been  told,"  says  Mason,  "  that  he  narrow. 
ly  escaped  suffocation  (owing  to  too  great  a  ful- 
ness of  blood,  which  destroyed  the  rest),  and 
would  certainly  have  been  cut  off  as  earl}^  had 
not  his  mother,  with  a  courage  remarkable  for 
one  of  her  sex,  and  withal  so  very  tender  a 
parent,  ventured  to  open  a  vein  with  her  own 
hand,  which  instantly  removed  the  paroxysm." 
In  addition  to  this  instance   of   his   mother's 

love  and  courage,  it  was  by  her  that  he  was 
t  17 


18  THE  LIFE 

supported,  both  as  a  child  and  at  school  and 
college,  as  his  father,  being  unsuccessful  and 
indolent,  lived  at  his  wife's  place  of  business 
and  on  her  earnings. 

Further,  the  poetry  of  Gray  and  all  we  have 
of  hira  we  owe  to  his  mother's  side  of  the 
house.  She  herself  belonged  to  Buckingham, 
shire ;  her  brothers,  Robert  and  William  Antro- 
bus,*  were  assistant  masters  at  Eton,  therefore 
Gray  was  sent  to  Eton  and  educated  under  the 
direction  of  his  uncle  Robert.  A  sister  of  hers 
was  married  to  Jonathan  Rogers,  a  lawyer  resid- 
ing  at  Burn  ham,  and  subsequently  at  Stoke- 
Poges,  or  Stoke,  not  far  from  Windsor,  and 
now  famous  the  world  over  for  the  churchyard 
of  the  "  Elegy  "  ;  and  from  his  house  at  Burnham 
Gray  described  the  celebrated  beeches,  and  at 
it  met  Southern,  the  author  of  "  Oroonoko,  in 
September  1737. 

*  The  Christian  names  of  Gray's  uncles  have  hitherto 
not  been  given  at  all  or  given  incorrectly.  His  first  biog- 
rapher, Mason,  merely  states  he  was  "  educated  at  Eton, 
under  the  care  of  Mr.  Antrobus,  his  mother's  brother, 
who  was  at  that  time,  one  of  the  Assistant  Masters,  and 
also  a  Fellow  of  St.  Peter's  College,  Cambridge."  Sub- 
sequent biographers  speak  only  of  his  "  uncle  Mr.  Antro- 
bus," some  adding  "  Fellow  of  Pembroke  College."  The 
mistakes  and  ambiguity  originated  in  the  fact  that  his 
mother  was,  as  Walpole  puts  it,  "  sister  to  two  Antro- 
bus's  who  were  ushei's  of  Eton  School."  From  the 
Provost  of  Eton  I  learn  that  they  were  Robert,  who  en- 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  I9 

At  Eton,  which  Gray  entered  in  1727,  he 

formed  a  friendship  with  two  schoolfellows, 

Horace  Walpole,  son  of  the  Prime  Minister, 

and  Kichard  West,  son  of  the  Lord  Chancellor 

of  Ireland,  and  grandson  of  the  famous  Bishop 

Burnet.     Associated  with  the  names  of  West 

and   Walpole   are  several   of  Gray's  poetical 

tered  Eton  College  as  a  pupil  in  1692,  and  William, 
admitted  Feb.  15,  1705.  According  to  Oraduati  Can- 
tabrigienses  Robert  Antrobus  graduated  at  Peterhouse 
in  1701,  and  William  Antrobus  at  King's  in  1713.  In 
the  Aliini7ii  Etonenses  the  entry  in  1709  opposite  William 
Antrobus  is  "  A.  B.  1713,  A.  M.  1717,  was  for  many- 
years  an  Assistant  of  Eton  School,  where  he  was 
tutor  to  the  Poet  Gray,  to  whom  he  was  uncle.  He  be- 
came Rector  of  Everdonin  Northamptonshire,  and  died 
in  1742."  In  Baker's  "  Northamptonshire  "  I  find  that 
he  was  "  instituted  as  Rector  of  Ever  don  on  21  Dec. 
1726,"  and  that  he  "  died  May  23,  1742."  Robert  died 
in  January  1729,  and  a  tablet  was  erected  to  his  memory 
in  Burnham  Church  by  his  brother-in-law,  Jonathan 
Rogers.  It  was  for  his  uncle  Robert,  therefore,  that 
Gray  was  in  mourning  when  Biyant  went  to  Eton,  "  at 
the  latter  end  of  the  year  1729,"  Mr.  Gosse  in  his  "Gray  " 
("English  Men  of  Letters")  speaks  of  Robert  and 
Thomas  Antrobus,  and  seems  to  have  assumed  that 
'  Thomas '  was  the  Christian  name,  from  the  draft  of  an 
unfinished  letter  to  Gray  from  his  tutor  at  Cambridge, 
in  which  he  says  he  would  do  any  service  for  his  "  uncle 
Antrobus  "  ;  after  this  there  is  a  word  which  looks  like 
Tlto^,  but  may  be  Tlio ' — the  beginning  of  a  new  and  un- 
finislied  sentence.  Mr.  Gosse's  quotation  from  the  let- 
ter is  otherwise  incorrect,  and  even  if  the  word  were 
Tho',  it  is  merely  a  slip  on  the  part  of  the  tutor. 


20  THE  LIFE 

compositions  and  many  of  his  most  interesting 
letters.  Other  school  friends  or  contempo- 
raries, with  whom  his  subsequent  career  was 
connected,  were  Thomas  Ashton,  George  Mon- 
tagu, Stonhewer,  Clarke,  William  Cole,  and 
Jacob  Bryant. 

"  He  was  educated,"  says  Horace  Walpole,* 
"  chiefly  under  the  direction  of  one  of  his  uncles, 
who  took  prodigious  pains  with  him,  which  an- 
swered exceedingly.  He  particularly  instruct- 
ed him  in  the  virtues  of  simples.  He  had  a 
great  genius  for  music  and  poetry."  Bryant, 
who  was  in  the  fourth  form  with  Gray  and 
Walpole, — "  the  former,"  he  says, "  being  about 
four  or  five  boys  below,  and  Walpole  as  many 
above," — thus  describes  Gray  :  "  He  was  in 
mourning  for  his  uncle,  Mr.  Antrobus,  who 
had  been  an  Assistant  Master  at  Eton,  and 
after  his  resignation  lived  and  died  there.  I 
remember  he  made  an  elegant  little  figure  in 
his  sable  dress,  for  he  had  a  very  good  com- 
plexion, and  fine  hair,  and  appeared  to  much 
advantage  among  the  boys  who  were  near 
him  in  the  school,  and  who  were  more  rough 
and  rude.  Indeed,  both  Mr.  Gray  and  his 
friend  were  looked  upon  as  too  delicate,  upon 
which   account  they  had  few  associates,  and 

*  In  a  memorandum  prefixed  to  Mitford's  "  Corre- 
spondence of  Gray  and  Mason." 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  21 

never  engaged  in  any  exercise,  nor  partook  of 
any  boyish  amusement.  Hence  they  seldom 
were  in  the  fields,  at  least  they  took  only  a 
distant  view  of  those  who  pursued  their  dif. 
ferent  diversions.  Some,  therefore,  who  were 
severe,  treated  them  as  feminine  characters,  on 
account  of  their  too  great  delicacy,  and  some- 
times a  too  fastidious  behaviour.  Mr.  Walpole 
long  afterwards  used  to  say  that  Gray  '  was 
never  a  boy.'  This  was  allowed  by  many  who 
remembered  him,  but  in  an  acceptance  very 
different  from  that  which  his  noble  friend  in- 
tended. Mr.  Gray  was  so  averse  to  rough  ex- 
ercise that  I  am  confident  he  was  never  on 
horseback." 

Of  West  Bryant  writes :  "  I  also  knew  him 
well,  and  looked  upon  him  as  an  extraordinary 
genius.  He  was  superior  to  Gray  in  learning, 
and  to  everybody  near  him.  He  was,  like  his 
friend,  quite  faultless  in  respect  to  morals  and 
behaviour,  and,  like  many  great  geniuses,  often 
very  eccentric  and  absent." 

In  1734  Gray  entered  Pembroke  Hall,  Cam- 
bridge ;  and  on  the  3rd  of  July  of  that  year 
was  admitted  to  Peterhouse,  the  college  of 
which  his  uncle  Eobert  had  been  a  Fellow. 
Walpole  entered  King's  College,  Cambridge, 
March,  1735 ;  and  about  the  same  time  West 
matriculated  in  Christ  Church,  Oxford.     The 


22  THE  LIFE 

intimacy  of  the  four  friends,  Gray,  "West, 
Walpole,  and  Ashton,  continued  at  the  Univer- 
sities, and  they  formed  what  they  called  the 
"  Quadruple  Alliance." 

At  Cambridge  Gray  was  studious  and  retir- 
ing ;  but  his  compositions  that  have  come  down 
to  us  are  few, — some  Latin  verse  (the  longest 
pieces  being  a  Hymeneal  on  the  marriage  of 
the  Prince  of  Wales  in  1736,  and  "  Luna  Habi- 
tabilis,"  a  College  exercise  set  in  1737,  and 
printed  in  "  MusaB  Etonenses  "),  and  a  transla- 
tion in  English  verse  of  about  one  hundred 
lines  of  the  "  Thebaid "  of  Statins,  which  he 
sent  to  West  in  May,  1736,  and  another  of  a 
passage  of  Tasso,  in  December,  1738.  The 
latter  was  first  published  in  Mathias'  edition 
in  1814 ;  the  last  lines  are  famous,  but  having 
been  incorrectly  printed  by  Mathias  they  have 
always  been  incorrectly  quoted.     They  are  : — 

Here  the  soft  emerald  smiles  of  verdant  hue, 
And  rubies  fiame,  with  sapphires  heavenly  blue, 
The  diamond  there  attracts  the  wond'ring  sight, 
Proud  of  its  thousand  dies,  and  luxury  of  light. 

Gray's  life  at  Cambridge  and  the  studies  pre- 
scribed by  the  university  were  most  distaste- 
ful to  him ;  mathematics  were  not  his  forte, 
and  his  fellow-students  were  not  congenial. 
"Writing  to  "West  in  December,  1736,  he  tells 
him    that  he  had  endured  lectures  daily  and 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  23 

hourly,  supported  by  the  hopes  of  being  able 
to  give  himself  up  to  his  friends  and  classical 
companions.  "  It  is  very  possible,"  he  writes, 
"  that  two  and  two  make  four,  but  I  would  not 
give  four  farthings  to  demonstrate  this  ever  so 
clearly  ;  and  if  these  be  profits  of  life,  give  me 
the  amusements  of  it.  The  people  I  behold  all 
around  me,  it  seems,  know  all  this  and  more, 
and  yet  I  do  not  know  one  of  them  who  in- 
spires me  with  any  ambition  of  being  like  him." 
In  his  other  letters  while  an  ungraduate  we 
see  the  melancholy — the  melancholy  of  "  II 
Penseroso" — so  characteristic  of  his  poetry  ;  the 
humour,  as  when  he  writes  to  West  "  you  need 
not  doubt  of  having  a  first  row  in  the  front 
box  of  my  little  heart,"  which  reappears  in  the 
"  Long  Story,"  and  some  satirical  pieces,  and 
is  everywhere  conspicuous  in  his  correspond- 
ence; and  the  love  and  admiration  of  Nature, 
— his  letter  from  Burnham  being  aptly  de- 
scribed as  the  "  first  expression  of  the  modern 
feeling  of  the  picturesque," — so  fully  developed 
in  his  after  life,  which  led  Sir  James  Mackin- 
tosh to  observe,  "  I  am  struck  by  the  recollec- 
tion of  a  sort  of  merit  in  Gray,  which  is  not 
generally  observed,  that  he  was  the  first  dis- 
coverer of  the  beauties  of  Nature  in  England, 
and  has  marked  out  the  course  of  every  pictur- 
esque journey  that  can  be  made  in  it." 


24  THE  LIFE 

In  September,  1738,  Gray  left  Cambridge 
without  taking  his  degree.  Shortly  after, 
Horace  "Walpole  invited  him  to  accompany  him 
on  a  tour  on  the  Continent,  Walpole  bearing 
the  expenses  of  both.  This  being  agreed  to, 
the  two  friends  started  from  Dover  on  the  29th 
of  March,  1739.  Gray  remained  abroad  for  over 
two  years,  and  visited  the  chief  places  of  interest 
in  France  and  Italy  ;  his  having  made  this  con- 
tinental tour  forming  one  of  many  points  of 
resemblance  between  him  and  Milton,  who, 
just  a  hundred  years  previously,  had  seen  many 
of  the  spots  and  sights  now  visited  by  Gray. 

Gray  and  Walpole  spent  two  months  at 
Paris,  the  summer  at  Rheims,  and  thence  pro- 
ceeded to  Dijon  and  Lyons,  and,  travelling 
through  Savoy,  visited  the  Grande  Chartreuse 
on  their  way  to  Geneva.  In  November  they 
arrived  at  Turin,  and  after  short  halts  at  Genoa, 
Parma,  and  Bologna,  they  reached  Florence, 
where  they  were  the  guests  of  Horace  Mann, 
and  this  was  their  headquarters  for  the  next 
fifteen  months.  The  April  and  May  of  1710 
were  spent  at  Rome  ;  June  at  Naples ;  and  the 
winter  of  1710-41  at  Florence.  In  the  end  of 
April,  1741,  at  Regio,  the  friends  had  a  dif- 
ference which  ended  in  their  parting  company. 
Gray  went  on  to  Venice,  where  he  spent  two 
months,  and  returning  home  through  the  north 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  26 

of  Italy,  arrived  in  London  from  Lyons  on  the 
1st  of  September,  1741. 

In  a  letter  to  Mason,  in  March,  1773,  Horace 
Walpole  takes  to  himself  the  blame  for  his 
quarrel  with  Gray  : — "  I  am  conscious,"  he 
says,  "  that  in  the  beginning  of  the  differences 
between  Gray  and  me  the  fault  was  mine.  I 
was  too  young,  too  fond  of  my  own  diversions ; 
nay,  I  do  not  doubt,  too  much  intoxicated  by 
indulgence,  vanity,  and  the  insolence  of  my 
situation  as  Prime  Minister's  son,  not  to  have 
been  inattentive  and  insensible  to  the  feelings 
of  one  I  thought  below  me.  ...  I  often  dis- 
regarded his  wishes  of  seeing  places  which  I 
would  not  quit  other  amusements  to  visit.  .  .  . 
You  will  not  wonder  that  with  the  dignity  of  his 
spirit  and  the  obstinate  carelessness  of  mine,  the 
breach  must  have  grown  wider  till  we  became  in- 
compatible." In  another  letter  he  says  :  "  We 
had  not  got  to  Calais  before  Gray  was  dissatis- 
fied, for  I  was  a  boy,  and  he,  though  infinitely 
more  a  man,  was  not  enough  so  to  make  allow- 
ances." 

During  this  tour  on  the  Continent  the  only 
poetry  that  Gray  wrote  was  some  Latin  verse 
— short  pieces  in  letters  to  West,  an  unfinished 
didactic  poem,  "  De  Principiis  Cogitandi,"  and 
an  ode  written  in  the  visitors'  album  at  the 
Grande  Chartreuse  on  his  second  visit  in  Au- 


26  THE  LIFE 

gust,  1741,  remarkably  not  only  for  its  Latinity, 
but  as  containing  similar  expressions  regarding 
himself  to  those  in  the  "  Progress  of  Poesy.'* 
As  yet  Gray  had  written  nothing  in  English 
poetry,  but  the  Letters  which  he  wrote  to  his 
friends,  describing  the  various  places  he  visited, 
deserve  the  encomium  passed  on  him  as  a  letter 
writer  by  Cowper,  himself  one  of  our  best  letter 
writers  : — "  I  have  been  reading  Gray's  works, 
and  think  him  the  only  poet  since  Shakespeare 
entitled  to  the  character  of  sublime.  ...  I 
once  thought  Swift's  Letters  the  best  that  could 
be  written,  but  I  like  Gray's  better.  His 
humour,  or  his  wit,  or  whatever  it  may  be 
called,  is  never  ill-natured  or  offensive,  and 
yet  I  think  equally  poignant  with  the  Dean's." 
Of  the  letters  from  the  Continent  that  have 
come  down  to  us,  thirteen  are  to  his  mother, 
eleven  to  "West,  and  five  to  his  father. 

Two  months  after  Gray's  return  to  England 
his  father  died,  on  the  6th  November,  1741. 
The  winter  he  spent  in  London,  and  the  sum- 
mer of  1742  at  Stoke  ;  to  this  place  his  mother 
and  aunt  retired,  joining  their  sister  there  on 
the  death  of  Mr.  Eogers,  in  October  1742  ;  and 
there  they  resided  till  their  death,  Gray  fre- 
quently paying  them  long  visits. 

In  December,  1741,  Gray  commenced  his  first 
original  composition  in  English  poetry — "  Agrip„ 


AND  WRITINGS  OP  GRAY.  27 

pin  a,"  a  tragedy  in  blank  verse ;  but  of  this 
he  wrote  only  a  single  scene,  consisting  of  a  long 
speech  by  Agrippina  ;  this  he  sent  to  West  for 
his  opinion  in  March,  1742,  and  partly  because 
he  condemned  the  style  as  too  antiquated,  Gray 
put  it  aside  and  never  resumed  it. 

The  year  1742  is  an  era  in  Gray's  life  as  a 
poet ;  in  the  summer  of  that  year  he  wrote 
at  Stoke-Poges  his  "  Ode  on  the  Spring," 
"  On  a  Distant  Prospect  of  Eton  College," 
"  Sonnet  on  the  Death  of  "West,"  and  the 
"Hymn  to  Adversity,"  and  in  the  autumn 
he  commenced  the  "  Elegy."  His  "  Ode  on 
the  Spring  "  he  sent  early  in  June  to  West,  but 
it  was  returned,  as  he  had  died  on  the  first 
of  that  month.  His  death,  immediately  follow- 
ing that  of  his  uncle  William  Antrobus,  greatly 
affected  Gray;  he  lamented  West  in  a  sonnet 
— the  first  of  any  value  that  had  been  written 
since  those  of  Milton,  and  in  the  "  Ode  on  Eton," 
written  in  the  same  month,  his  recent  losses 
caused  him  to  take  too  gloomy  a  view  of  the 
'  fields '  of  his  boyhood,  now  considered  to  have 
been  '  beloved  in  vain,'  and  of  the  future  of  the 
'  sprightly  race '  in  whom  he  sees  only  '  the  little 
victims  of  Misfortune  and  Sorrow.'  But  the 
'  Quadruple  Alliance '  was  broken  not  by  death 
only,  it  had  ceased  to  exist.  Gray  having  fallen 
out   with  Ashton  as  well   as    with  Walpoie. 


28  THE  LIFE 

"  The  late  unhappy  disagreement  and  separa- 
tion," says  Bryant,  "  were  at  that  time  upper- 
most in  his  mind,  and  when  he  contemplated 
this  scene  of  concord  and  boyish  happiness 
he  could  not  help,  in  his  melancholy  mood, 
forming  a  contrast.  He  was  led  to  consider 
the  feuds  and  quarrels  which  were  likely  one 
day  to  ensue,  when  all  that  harmony  and  hap- 
piness was  to  cease  and  enmity  and  bitterness 
were  to  succeed.  It  is  a  gloomy  picture,  but 
finely  executed,  and  whoever  reads  the  descrip- 
tion with  this  clue,  will  find  that  it  was  formed 
from  a  scene  before  his  eyes.  The  poet  saw  and 
experimentally  felt  what  he  so  masterly  de- 
scribes. I  lived  at  that  time  almost  upon  the 
very  spot  which  gave  birth  to  these  noble  ideas, 
and  in  consequence  of  it  saw  the  author  very 
often."  Standing  alone  then,  owing  to  the 
death  of  one  friend  and  his  difference  with  the 
others,  he  can  only  '  look  homeward '  and  see  his 
own  case  in  the  future  of  all — Despair,  Un- 
kindness,  and  Remorse.  It  is  a  distorted  view 
and  a  one-sided  picture,  with  no  bright  side ;  as 
was  well  observed  by  the  Earl  of  Carlisle,* 
"  how  many  germs  of  future  excellence,  how 
much  budding  promise  of  yet  undeveloped 
genius  and  unexercised  virtue  he  might  have 

*  Lecture  on  the  Writings  of  Gray,  delivered  at  the 
Sheffield  Mechanics'  Institute,  Dec.  14,  1853. 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  29 

discovered ;  ....  of  the  last  six  Prime  Min- 
isters four  iiave  been  Eton  men,  and  not  very 
long  after  the  Poet  had  cast  his  desponding 
glance  upon  that  boyish  group,  among  those 
who  disported  on  the  '  margent  green '  was 
Arthur  Wellesiey,  Duke  of  Wellington." 

None  of  these  poems,  however,  was  published 
for  several  years ;  the  first  that  appeared  in 
print  being  the  "  Ode  on  Eton  College,"  which 
was  published  anonymously  in  pamphlet  form 
by  itself  in  1747.  Next  year,  the  "  Ode  on 
Eton  College,"  the  "  Ode  on  the  Spring,"  and 
"  Ode  on  the  Death  of  a  Favourite  Cat"  were 
published  in  Dodsley's  "  Collection  of  Poems," 
but  without  Gray's  name. 

In  the  winter  of  1742  Gray  returned  to  Cam- 
bridgfe,  and  went  into  residence  at  Peterhouse. 
He  graduated  as  LL.B.  in  1744,*  and  for  the 
rest  of  his  life  made  Cambridge  his  home,  with 
occasional  visits  to  Stoke,  to  London,  and  to 
friends  in  the  country.  The  next  four  or  five 
years  he  devoted  to  reading,  his  chief  study 
being  the  literature  and  history  of  ancient 
Greece.  In  Dec.  1746,  he  writes,  "  We  are  in 
the  midst  of  Diog.  Laertius  and  his  philoso- 
phers, as  a  prooeraium  to  the  series  of  their 
works,  and  those  of  all  the  poets  and  orators 

*  So  in  Oraduati  Cantabrigienses.    Mason  and  sub- 
sequent editors  say  1743. 


22— G  &  Q— P 


30  THE  LIFE 

that  lived  before  Philip  of  Macedon's  death, 
and  we  have  made  a  great  Chronological  Table 
with  our  own  hands,  the  wonder  and  amaze- 
ment of  Mr.  Brown ;  not  so  much  for  public 
events,  but  rather,  in  a  literary  way,  to  com- 
pare the  times  of  all  great  men,  their  writings 
and  transactions."  In  March  1747,  he  writes : 
— "  I  have  read  Pausanias  and  Athenaeus  all 
through,  and  ^schylus  again.  I  am  now  in 
Pindar  and  Lysias,  for  I  take  verse  and  prose 
tegether  like  bread  and  cheese.  The  Chronol- 
ogy is  growing  daily."  He  also  wrote  notes 
and  long  commentaries  on  Plato  and  Aris- 
tophanes, a  learned  description  of  India  and 
Persia,  in  which  he  cites  over  ninety  ancient 
and  modern  authors  whose  works  he  had  com- 
pared in  this  study.  This  and  the  notes  on 
Plato  and  Aristophanes  were  first  published 
by  Mathias,  the  former  two  from  Gray's  "  Com- 
mon Place  Books  "  at  Pembroke  College,  which 
contain  besides  many  learned  and  interesting 
historical  and  literary  notes  still  unpublished. 

An  event  of  importance  to  us  as  well  as  to 
Gray  was  his  reconciliation,  in  November,  1745, 
with  Horace  Walpole,  as  the  latter  not  only 
induced  Gray  to  let  his  poems  appear  in  print, 
but  actually  published  the  first  collected  edition 
of  them  at  his  own  press  at  Strawberry  Hill. 
Another  interesting  incident  was  an  interview 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  31 

between  Gray  and  Pope,  which  took  place 
probably  not  long  before  the  death  of  the  lat- 
ter (May  30,  1744).  In  1747  he  made  the  ac- 
quaintance of  one  who  for  the  rest  of  his  life 
was  one  of  his  most  intimate  friends,  and  des- 
tined to  be  his  executor  and  biographer — Wil- 
liam Mason,  then  a  young  scholar  of  St.  John's 
College,  and  already  a  minor  poet.  Gray  him- 
self was  still  unknown  as  a  poet  or  an  author ; 
it  was  without  his  name  that  his  three  Odes 
were  published  in  Dodsley's  "  Collection  "  in 
1748,  and  at  this  time  he  was  over  thirty  years 
of  age. 

During  the  first  half  of  his  life  at  Cambridge 
Gray's  most  intimate  friends  besides  Mason 
(appointed  Rector  of  Aston  in  Yorkshire  in 
1754,  and  Precentor  of  York  in  1761),  were  the 
Rev.  James  Brown,  Fellow  and  afterwards 
Master  of  Pembroke,  and  Thomas  Wharton, 
M.D.,  an  ex-Fellow,  residing  at  Old  Park  near 
Durham.  His  correspondence  was  mainly  with 
these  three;  the  two  former  he  appointed  his 
executors,  and  he  frequently  went  on  visits  to 
Mason  at  York,  and  to  Wharton  in  Durham. 

The  death  of  his  aunt  Mary  at  Stoke  in 
November,  1749,  seems  to  have  led  Gray  to 
take  up  again  the  unfinished  "  Elegy  "  which 
he  had  commenc.ed  just  seven  years  previously  ; 
he  kept  touching  it  up  for  some  mouths  longer, 


32  THE  LIFE 

and  when  at  last  finished  he  sent  a  copy  of  it 
to  Horace  Walpoie  on  the  12th  June,  1750. 
"Walpole  having  handed  the  verses  about,  it 
got  into  the  hands  of  the  editors  of  the  "  Ma- 
gazine of  Magazines,"  who  wrote  to  Gray  in- 
forming him  of  their  intention  to  print  it.  To 
anticipate  them  Gray  requested  Walpole  to 
have  it  published  at  once,  and  thus  this  famous 
poem  appeared,  in  a  quarto  pamphlet,  on  the 
16th  February,  1751,  entitled  "  An  Elegy  Wrote 
in  a  Country  Church-Yard,"  price  sixpence. 

The  poem  became  popular  at  once,  and  the 
name  of  the  author  was  soon  known,  he  was 
the  '  celebrated  Mr.  Gray,'  and  it,  in  Dr.  John- 
son's words,  '  the  far-famed  Elegy.''  It  went 
through  four  editions  in  two  months,  and  soon 
reached  the  eleventh  ;  and  not  only  did  it  appear 
in  almost  every  magazine  and  in  all  Collections 
of  Poems,  but  it  was  translated  into  Greek, 
Latin,  and  Hebrew,  and  into  almost  every  lan- 
guage of  Modern  Europe,  and  polyglot  editions 
of  it  published.  To  no  other  modern  poem  had 
such  homage  been  paid  and  so  abundantly. 
Nor  should  the  story  of  the  tribute  paid  to  the 
"  Elegy  "  on  an  historical  occasion  a  few  years 
later  be  omitted.  On  the  13th  of  September, 
1759,  the  night  before  the  battle  on  the  Plains 
of  Abraham,  General  Wolfe  was  descending 
the  St.  Lawrence   with  a  part  of  his  troops. 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  gg 

"Swiftly  but  silently,"  writes  Lord  Mahon, 
"did  the  boats  fall  down  with  the  tide,  unob- 
served by  the  enemy's  sentinels  at  their  posts 
along  the  shore.  Of  the  soldiers  on  board, 
how  eagerly  must  every  heart  have  throbbed 
at  the  coming  conflict !  how  intently  must 
every  eye  have  contemplated  the  dark  outline, 
as  it  lay  pencilled  upon  the  midnight  sky,  and 
as  every  moment  it  grew  closer  and  clearer,  of 
the  hostile  heights  !  Not  a  word  was  spoken — 
not  a  sound  heard  beyond  the  rippling  of  the 
stream.  Wolfe  alone — thus  tradition  has  told 
us — repeated  in  a  low  tone  to  the  other  ofHcers 
in  his  boat  those  beautiful  stanzas  with  which 
a  country  churchyard  inspired  the  muse  of 
Gray.  One  noble  line —  '  The  paths  of  glory 
lead  but  to  the  grave,'  must  have  seemed  at 
such  a  moment  fraught  with  mournful  meaning. 
At  the  close  of  the  recitation  Wolfe  added, 
*  Now,  gentlemen,  I  would  rather  be  the  author 
of  that  poem  than  take  Quebec'  " 

To  the  lover  of  Gray,  however,  more  pleas- 
ing than  such  distinctions  as  these  is  the  thought 
that  his  mother — that  careful  tender  mother 
— lived  to  read  the  words  that  now  every  one 
knows,  and  to  hear  of  the  fame  of  the  son  who 
had  so  fully  requited  her  love. 

In  the  autumn  of  1750  Gray  wrote  the  hu- 
morous verses  entitled   a   "  Long    Story," — a 


34  THE  LIFE 

mock-heroic  or  burlesque  account  of  his  intro- 
duction to  Lady  Cobham  and  Miss  Speed  at  the 
Manor  House  at  Stoke-Poges. 

The  year  1753  is  remarkable  in  Gray's  lit- 
erary life  for  the  publication  of  a  handsome  edi- 
tion of  his  poems  with  illustrations  by  Richard 
Bentley.  The  work  was  in  reality  planned  by 
Horace  Walpole,  who  persuaded  Gray  to  allow 
the  poems  to  be  printed,  paid  Bentley  for  his 
drawings,  and  supervised  the  work  generally. 
In  Walpole's  brief  sketch  of  Gray  he  thus  de- 
scribes the  work  :  "  In  March,  1753,  was  pub- 
lished a  fine  edition  of  his  poems,  with  frontis- 
pieces, head  and  tail  pieces  and  initial  letters, 
engraved  by  Grignion  and  Miiller,  after  draw- 
ings of  Richard  Bentley,  Esq."  So  modest 
was  Gray  as  to  his  contribution  to  the  work 
that  instead  of  its  being  called  "  Poems  with 
Designs,"  he  caused  it  to  be  named  "  Designs 
by  Mr.  R.  Bentley  for  Six  Poems  by  Mr.  T. 
Gray."  The  Six  Poems  were  the  "  Ode  on  the 
Spring,"  "  Ode  on  the  Death  of  a  Favourite 
Cat,"  "  Ode  on  Eton  College,"  "  A  Long  Story," 
"  Hymn  to  Adversity,"  and  the  "  Elegy."  In, 
March,  1753,  Gray's  mother  died  at  Stoke,  and 
was  buried  in  the  same  grave  as  that  in  which 
her  sister  had  been  laid  a  few  years  previously. 
The  inscription  on  the  tombstone  is  the  compo- 
sition of  Gray,  and  is  a  witness  at  once  to  his 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  35 

own  faith  and  to  his  love  for  the  mother  to 
whom  he  owed  so  much.  It  runs  :  "  In  the  vault 
beneath  are  deposited,  in  hope  of  a  joyful  resur- 
rection, the  remains  of  Mary  Antrobus.  She 
died  unmarried,  Nov,  5,  1749,  aged  6Q.  In  the 
same  pious  confidence,  beside  her  friend  and  sis- 
ter, here  sleep  the  remains  of  Dorothy  Gray, 
widow,  the  careful,  tender  Mother  of  many  chil- 
dren, one  of  whom  alone  had  the  misfortune  to 
survive  her.    She  died  March  11, 1753,  aged  67.'' 

In  the  July  of  1753  Gray  made  a  leisurely 
journey  from  Cambridge  to  Durham,  where  he 
spent  two  months  with  Dr.  "Wharton.  In  the 
autumn  he  was  again  at  Stoke,  tending  on  his 
aunt,  who  "  had  a  stroke  of  the  palsy,"  refer- 
ring to  which  he  writes :  "  Stoke  has  revived 
in  me  the  memory  of  many  a  melancholy  hour 
that  I  have  passed  in  it,  and,  though  I  have  no 
longer  the  same  cause  for  anxiet}'',  I  do  not  find 
myself  at  all  the  happier  for  thinking  that  I 
have  lost  it,  as  my  thoughts  do  not  signify 
anything  to  any  one  but  myself.  I  shall  wish 
to  change  the  scene  as  soon  as  ever  I  can." 

In  the  autumn  of  1754  he  visited  Stowe, 
Woburn,  Wroxton  and  Warwick,  and  wrote  a 
long  description  of  the  latter  to  Wharton. 
About  the  same  time  he  wrote  his  learned  Essay 
on  Norman  Architecture  ;  it  is  written  from 
a  classical  standpoint,  but  his  accuracy  of  ob- 


36  THE  LIFE 

servation,  considering  the  time  at  which  he 
wrote,  is  very  remarkable.  To  1754  also  be- 
longs his  unfinished  "  Ode  on  the  Pleasure  aris- 
ing from  Vicissitude ; "  had  he  completed  this 
it  would  have  ranked  with  the  greatest  of  his 
poems.  One  verse  will  bear  quoting  again,  the 
thoughts  as  well  as  some  of  the  words  are  those 
of  Wordsworth  : — 

"  See  the  Wretch,  that  long  has  tost 

On  the  thorny  bed  of  pain, 
At  length  repair  his  vigour  lost, 

And  breathe  and  walk  again  ; 
The  meanest  flowret  of  the  vale, 
The  simplest  note  that  swells  the  gale* 
The  common  sun,  the  air,  the  skies, 
To  him  are  opening  paradise." 

In  December,  1754,  Gray  completed  and  sent 
to  Dr.  "Wharton  an  '  Ode  in  the  Greek  manner,' 
requesting  him  "  by  no  means  to  suffer  it  to  be 
copied,  nor  even  to  show  it  unless  to  very  few." 
This  Ode  was  what  was  subsequently  known  as 
"  The  Progress  of  Poesy  "  ;  it  and  the  compan- 
ion Ode,  "  The  Bard,"  are  the  most  original  of 
his  productions,  and  at  the  same  time  show  his 
art  at  its  highest. 

In  July,  1755,  Gray  paid  a  visit  to  Mr.  Chute 
at  the  Vyne  in  Hampshire ;  after  which  he 
visited  Portsmouth,  where  he  saw  the  fleet, 
and  from  Portsdown  had  a  "  magnificent  and 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  37 

varied  prospect  of  Hampshire,  Berkshire,  and 
the  Isle  of  Wight." 

"In  the  winter  of  1755,"  says  "Walpole, 
"George  Hprvey,  Earl  of  Bristol,  who  was 
soon  afterwards  sent  Envoy  to  Turin,  was  de- 
signed for  Minister  to  Lisbon  ;  he  offered  to 
carry  Gray  as  his  secretary,  but  he  declined 
it." 

In  March,  1756,  Gray  removed  from  Peter- 
house  to  Pembroke,  an  event  which  he  says 
"  may  be  looked  upon  as  a  sort  of  era  in  a  life 
so  barren  of  events  as  mine."  The  cause  of 
this  move  was  the  annoyance  he  received  from 
some  noisy  students  who  occupied  part  of  the 
same  building ;  it  is  zJid  that  a  practical  joke 
was  played  on  him,  but  in  writing  to  Wharton 
he  says:  "  I  left  my  lodgings  because  the  rooms 
were  noisy  and  the  people  dirty  ;  this  is  all  I 
would  choose  to  have  said  about  it." 

"  The  Bard  "  was  commenced  early  in  1755, 
and  laid  aside,  nothing  apparently  being  done 
at  it  in  1756 ;  but  in  May,  1757,  in  a  fit  of  en- 
thusiasm roused  by  some  concerts  given  at 
Cambridge  bv  John  Parrv,  the  famous  blind 
harper,  Gray  at  length  finished  it.  He  thus 
describes  the  incident  in  a  letter  to  Mason  : — 
"  Mr.  Parry  has  been  here  and  scratched  out 
such  ravishing  blind  harmony,  such  tunes  of 
a  thousand  years  old,  with  names  enough  to 


38  THE  LIFE 

choke  you,  as  have  set  all  this  learned  body 
a-dancing,  and  inspired  them  with  due  rever- 
ence for  my  old  Bard,  his  countryman,  when- 
ever he  shall  appear.  Parry,  you  must  know, 
put  my  Ode  in  motion  again,  and  has  brought 
it  at  last  to  a  conclusion." 

In  August,  1757,  the  two  Pindaric  Odes,  with 
the  simple  title  of  "  Odes  by  Mr.  Gray,"  were 
printed  at  a  private  printing  press  that  Horace 
Walpole  had  set  up  at  Strawberry  Hill, "  being," 
as  he  tells  us,  "  the  first  production  of  that 
printing-house."  The  motto  Gray  adopted, 
from  Pindar,  was  (Pwvdvra  aoveroiai — '  vocal  to 
the  intelligent.'  His  reputation  as  a  poet  was 
made  at  once,  but  it  w^^i  evident  that  he  had 
judged  rightly  in  assuming  that  all  his  readers 
and  critics  could  not  be  included  among  the  '  in- 
telligent.' In  a  letter  to  Dr.  Wharton  a  couple 
of  months  after  the  publication  of  the  Odes, 
Gray  wrote : — "  Dr.  "Warburton  is  come  to 
town,  and  I  am  told  likes  them  extremely ;  he 
says  the  world  never  passed  so  just  an  opinion 
upon  anything  as  upon  them  ;  for  that  in  other 
things  they  have  affected  to  like  or  to  dislike, 
whereas  here  they  own  they  do  not  understand, 
which  he  looks  on  to  be  very  true;  but  yet 
thinks  they  understand  them  as  well  as  Milton 
or  Shakespeare,  whom  they  are  obliged  by 
fashion  to  admire.    Mr.  Gar  rick's  compiimen- 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  39 

tary  verses  to  me  you  have  seen ;  I  am  told 
they  were  printed  *  in  the  '  Chronicle '  of  last 
Saturday.  The  '  Critical  Review  '  is  in  rap- 
tures,  but  mistakes  the  JEolian  lyre  for  the 
harp  of  ^olus,  and  on  this  pleasant  error 
founds  both  a  compliment  and  a  criticism. 
Oliver  Goldsmith  reviewed  the  Odes  in  the 
"  London  Monthly  Review "  for  September, 
and  observes  of  them  ; — "  they  will  give  as 
much  pleasure  to  those  who  relish  this  species 
of  composition  as  anything  that  has  hitherto 
appeared  in  our  language,  the  odes  of  Dryden 
himself  not  excepted."  David  Garrick's  stanzas 
were  six  in  number,  of  which  the  following 
two  may  be  quoted  as  a  specimen  of  the  great 
actor's  verse  and  of  his  mode  of  treating  the 
subject: — 

Repine  not,  Gray,  that  our  weak  dazzled  eyes 
Thy  daring  heights  and  brightness  shun  ; 

How  few  can  trace  the  eagle  to  the  skies, 
Or,  like  him,  gaze  upon  the  sun  !  .  .  . 

Yet  droop  not,  Gray,  nor  quit  thy  heaven-born  art ; 

Again  thy  wondrous  powers  reveal  : 
Wake  slumbering  Virtue  in  the  Briton's  heart, 

And  rouse  us  to  reflect  and  feel ! 

Small  as  the  amount  of  Gray's  poetical  work 

*  Appeared  anonymously  in  the  "  London  Chronicle," 
October  1,  1757. 


40  THE  LIFE 

had  been  he  was  recognized  as  the  greatest 
living  poet,  and  in  December,  1767,  on  the 
death  of  Colley  Gibber,  he  was  offered  the  post 
of  Poet-Laureate.  Tiiis  Gray  declined,  ob- 
serving, in  a  letter  to  Mason,  "  I  rather  wish 
somebody  may  accept  it  that  will  retrieve  the 
credit  of  the  thing,  if  it  be  retrievable  or  ever 
had  any  credit.  .  .  .  Dryden  was  as  disgrace- 
ful to  the  office  from  his  character,  as  the 
poorest  scribbler  could  have  been  from  his 
verses.  The  office  itself  has  always  humbled 
the  possessor  hitherto  (even  in  an  age  when 
kings  were  somebody),  if  he  were  a  poor  writer 
by  making  him  more  conspicuous,  and  if  he 
were  a  good  one  by  setting  him  at  war  with 
the  little  fry  of  his  own  profession,  for  there 
are  poets  little  enough  to  envy  even  a  poet- 
laureate." 

In  1759  Gray  lived  mostly  in  London,  lodging 
in  Southampton  Row  to  be  near  the  British 
Museum,  which  had  been  opened  to  the  public 
in  the  January  of  that  year  ;  and  here  he  read 
for  several  hours  almost  daily,  and  copied  MSS. 
of  Wyatt  and  Lydgate.  He  continued  at  this 
and  similar  work  in  the  winter  of  1760-61,  copy- 
ing out  Gawin  Douglas'  "  Palace  of  Honour," 
and  composing  his  "  Observations  on  English 
Metre,"  and  other  notes  for  a  History  of  Eng- 
lish Poetry  he  was  then  planning,  which  he  re- 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  41 

fers  to  in  the  advertisement  to  his  "  Fatal  Sis- 
ters." 

In  1Y60  Lady  Cobham  died  and  left  Gray 
twenty  guineas.  In  his  pocket-book  for  that 
year  opposite  April  15,  I  have  noted  the  follow- 
ing, "  Lady  Cobham's  legacy,  £21,"  and  on  the 
same  day  "  borrowed  of  Dr.  Clarke,  £15,"  and 
paid  for  a  "  pair  of  velvet  breeches,  £2  2s."  In 
September  he  paid  "  M.  Antrobus  for  linen  and 
ruffles,  six  shirts  and  making,  £5  95." ;  and  on 
"  14  Nov.  bought  a  lottery  ticket,  £5  8s.  6d. ;  it 
came  out  a  blank  on  the  18th." 

In  the  autumn  of  1762  Gray  made  a  tour 
in  Yorkshire  and  Derby,  visiting  Richmond, 
Kipon,  Sheffield,  and  Chatsworth,  and  other 
places  of  interest.  On  his  return  to  Cambridge 
he  found  that  the  Professorship  of  Modern 
History  was  vacant,  and,  being  "  spirited  up  by 
some  friends,"  Gray  got  his  name  suggested  to 
Lord  Bute ;  he  also  wrote  to  Mr.  Chute  *  asking 
him  to  find  "  an  opportunity  to  mention  it  to 
Mr.  W.,"  observing,  "  I  certainly  might  ask  it 
with  as  much  or  more  propriety  than  anyone 
in  this  place ;  if  anything  more  were  done,  it 
should  be  as  private  as  possible,  for  if  the  peo- 
ple who  have  any  sway  here  could  prevent  it, 
1  think  they  would  most  zealously."  Gray 
soon  got  his  answer  from  Bute — "  great  profes- 
*  Letter  in  "  Gray  and  his  Friends,"  p.  184. 


42  THE  LIFE 

sions  of  his  desire  to  serve  me  on  any  future 
occasion,  and  many  more  line  words," — and 
the  place  was  given  to  Lawrence  Brockett, 
tutor  to  Sir  James  Lowther,  Bute's  son-in-law.* 
This  must  have  been  very  galling  to  the  sensi- 
tive nature  of  Gray ;  he  had  never  asked  for 
anything  before ;  and  when  in  1759  it  was 
thought  that  Dr.  Turner,  the  Professor,  was 
going  to  die,  in  a  letter  to  Dr.  Brown  Gray  says 
he  had  been  sounded  as  to  whether  he  would 
take  it,  but  he  "  would  not  ask  for  it,  not 
choosing  to  be  refused." 

In  August,  1764,  he  made  an  excursion  to 
Scotland  ;  from  Cumberland  he  visited  Dum- 
fries, the  Falls  of  the  Clyde,  Glasgow  (where 
he  met  Foulis,  the  publisher),  Loch  Lomond, 
Stirling,  Hawthornden,  Melrose,  Edinburgh, 
and  places  near  it.  In  October  he  made  a  short 
tour  in  the  south  of  England,  visiting  Win- 
chester, Southampton,  Netley  Abbey,  Salisbury, 
Wilton,  and  Stonehenge.  His  descriptions  of 
the  places  he  visits  are  as  usual  most  charming 
reading,  especially  where  he  writes  on  the  spot 
"  after  the  finest  walk  in  the  finest  day  that 
ever  shone  to  Netley  Abbey." 

In  the  autumn  of  1765  Gray  paid  a  second 
visit  to  Scotland,  stopping  for  a  while  at  Edin- 

*  See  an  allusion  to  this  in  Macaulay's  Essay  on 
Chatham. 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  43 

burgh,  where  he  "  supped  with  Dr.  Robertson  * 
and  other  hterati."  From  Glamis  he  wrote  a 
long  letter  to  Dr.  Wharton,  describing  the  cas- 
tle and  the  surrounding  country.  Thence  he 
passed  westward,  still  as  Lord  Strathmore's 
guest,  to  Dunkeld,  and,  by  a  road  winding  with 
the  Tav,  to  the  falls  of  the  Tummell  and  the 
Pass  of  Killiecrankie,  close  by  which  "  rises  a 
hill  covered  with  oak,  with  grotesque  masses  of 
rock  staring  from  among  their  trunks,  like  the 
sullen  countenances  of  Fingal  and  all  his  family 
frowning  on  the  little  morals  of  modern  days." 
He  returned  from  the  Highlands,  '  charmed 
with  his  expedition  ;'  "  the  mountains,"  he 
says,  "  are  ecstatic,  and  ought  to  be  visited  in 
pilgrimage  once  a  year  ;  none  but  those  mon- 
strous creatures  of  God  know  how  to  join  so 
much  beauty  with  so  much  horror.  .  .  .  Italy 
could  hardly  produce  a  nobler  scene,  and  this 
so  sweetly  contrasted  with  that  perfection  of 
nastiness  and  total  want  of  accommodation  that 
Scotland  only  can  supply." 

While  he  was  stopping  at  Glamis  Castle, 
the  Marischal  College  of  Aberdeen  offered  to 
confer  on  Gray  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws  ; 
this  proposal  was  made  through  Dr.  James 
Beattie,  Professor  of   Moral   Philosophy  and 

*  Author  of  "  History  of  Scotland,"  1759  ;  "  History 
of  the  Reign  of  Charles  the  Fifth,"  1769,  etc. 


4i  THE  LIFE 

author  of  the  "  Minstrel."  Gray  declined  the 
honour,  on  the  ground  that  he  had  not  finished 
his  course  for  the  doctor's  degree  at  Cambridge, 
and  therefore,  he  says,  "  I  certainly  would 
avoid  giving  any  offence  to  a  set  of  men, 
among  whom  I  have  passed  so  many  happy 
hours  of  my  life  ;  yet  shall  ever  retain  in  my 
memory  the  obligations  you  have  laid  me  under, 
and  be  proud  of  my  connection  with  the  Uni- 
versity of  Aberdeen." 

In  1766  he  passed  the  end  of  May  and  all 
June  in  Kent,  visiting  "  Margate  (one  would 
think  it  was  Bartholomew  Fair  that  had  flown 
down  from  Smithfield  in  the  London  machine ), 
Ramsgate,  Sandwich,  Deal,  and  Dover,  and 
Folkestone,  and  Hy  the,  all  along  the  coast  very 
delightful."  Here  again  his  descriptions  of 
the  scenery  are  poetry  in  prose,  "  showing  an 
eye  for  nature  then  without  a  precedent  in 
modern  literature  "  : — "  The  country  is  all  a 
garden,  gay,  rich,  and  fruitful,  and  from  the 
rainy  season  had  preserved,  till  I  left  it,  all 
that  emerald  verdure,  which  commonly  one 
only  sees  for  the  first  fortnight  of  the  spring. 
In  the  west  part  of  it  from  every  eminence  the 
eye  catches  some  long  winding  reach  of  the 
Thames  or  Med  way,  with  all  their  navigation ; 
in  the  east  the  sea  breaks  in  upon  you,  and 
mixes  its  white  transient   sails  of  glittering 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  45 

blue    expanse   with   the   deeper  and  brighter 
greens  of  the  woods  and  corn." 

In  1768,  Dodsley  having  asked  Gray  to  allow 
him  to  republish  his  poems,  there  appeared  the 
first  complete  edition  of  the  poems  he  wished 
to  make  public.  These  numbered  only  ten, — 
five  of  the  six  that  were  published  in  the  edi- 
ton  of  1753  (the  "  Long  Story  "  being  now 
omitted),  his  two  Pindaric  Odes  and  three 
Odes  from  the  Norse.  In  this  edition  he  sup- 
plied explanatory  footnotes,  for  which  he 
sarcastically  apologizes,  in  a  prefatory  note  to 
the  "  Progress  of  Poesy  "  (see  p.  189)  ;  but  in 
one  of  his  letters  with  less  reserve  he  states 
that  he  added  the  notes  "  out  of  spite  because 
the  public  did  not  understand  the  two  Odes 
which  I  call  Pindaric,  though  the  first  is  not 
very  dark,  and  the  second  alluded  to  a  few 
common  facts  to  be  found  in  any  sixpenny 
history  of  England,  by  way  of  question  and 
answer  for  the  use  of  children."  At  the  same 
time,  on  the  suggestion  of  Beattie,  another 
edition  of  the  same  poems  was  published  in 
Glasgow  by  Foul  is  ;  this  was  a  large  and  hand- 
some book.  In  the  advertisement  to  it  the 
publishers  state  that  "  as  an  expression  of  their 
high  esteem  and  gratitude,  they  have  endeav- 
oured to  print  it  in  the  best  manner ; "  and 
that  it  is  "  the  first  work  in  the  Roman  charac- 


40  THE  LIFE 

ter  which  they  have  printed  with  so  large  a 
type." 

On  the  24th  of  July,  1768,  the  Professorship 
of  Modern  History  again  fell  vacant,  and  it 
was  at  once  offered,  unsolicited,  to  Gray  by 
the  Duke  of  Grafton,  then  Prime  Minister.  In 
the  same  week,  Gray  attended  the  King's 
levee,  and  kissed  hands  on  his  appointment  ; 
in  letters  to  his  friends  he  says  the  King  made 
him  several  gracious  speeches,  and  told  him 
that  he  owed  his  nomination  to  his  "  particular 
knowledge  "  of  him.  This  professorship,  which 
was  worth  £400  a  year,  had  always  been  a 
sinecure,  as  the  professor  was  not  required  to 
deliver  any  lectures.  Gray,  however,  drew  up 
a  plan  for  an  inaugural  lecture  ;  and  in  1771 
"  Rules  *  concerning  the  Lectures  in  Modern 
History "  were  issued,  but  the  first  lectures 
were  by  Dr.  Symonds,  Gray's  successor. 

The  Duke  of  Grafton  having  been  appointed 
Chancellor  of  the  University,  Gray  undertook 
to  write  the  customary  Installation  Ode.  Dr. 
Burney  was  anxious  to  be  the  composer,  but 
it  was  set  to  music  by  the  Professor  of  Music, 
and  performed  at  the  Installation  on  the  1st 
July,  1769.  This  Ode  is  on  a  well-conceived 
plan,  and  contains  several  passages  in  Gray's 

*  A  copy  may  be  seen  in  the  Webb  collection,  Uni- 
versity Library. 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  47 

best  style,  such  as  that  beautiful  stanza,  in 
which,  as  Hallam  says,  "  he  has  made  the 
founders  of  Cambridge  pass  before  our  eyes 
like  shadows  over  a  magic  glass." 

In  October,  1769,  Gray  made  a  tour  in  the 
Lake  country,  visiting  UUes water,  Borrowdale, 
Lodore,  Ambleside,  Grasmere,  Rydal,and  other 
places  afterwards  to  be  associated  with  the 
Lake  poets,  and  celebrated  by  Wordsworth  and 
Southey.  He  wrote  a  journal  of  this  tour  for 
the  amusement  of  his  friend,  Dr.  Wharton, 
which  was  published  in  Mason's  "  Memoirs  "  in 
1775  among  Gray's  Letters  to  Wharton.  This 
graphic  and  picturesque  narrative,  with  its 
wonderful  descriptions  of  the  scenery  of  Ulles- 
water  and  Borrowdale,  and  of  the  Lodore 
waterfall,  should  be  read  in  Mr.  Gosse's  edition, 
vol.  i.  pp.  249-281,  and  with  them  Wordsworth's 
"  Daffodils,"  "  Yew  Trees,"  and  the  "  Evening 
Walk."  The  similarity  of  language  in  the  two 
poets  in  more  than  one  passage  is  too  striking 
to  be  merely  accidental.  Writing  of  a  Avalk  to 
Crow  Park,  Gray's  note  is : — "  At  distance 
heard  the  murmur  of  manv  waterfalls  not 
audible  in  the  daytime."  This  re-appears  in 
the  "  White  Doe  "  :— 

"  A  soft  and  lulling  sound  is  heard 
Of  streams  inaudible  by  day." 

In   1760   Gray   took  a   fancy  to  an  under- 


48  THE  LIFE 

graduate,  Norton  Nicholls,  and  continued  to 
keep  up  an  interesting  correspondence  with  him 
after  he  had  left  college  and  had  become  a 
country  clergyman  in  Suffolk. 

Through  Nicholls  Gray  formed  another 
friendship,  which  seemed  serviceable  to  him  in 
taking  him  out  of  himself  ;  this  was  with  a 
young  Swiss  gentleman  named  Bonstetten, 
who  had  come  over  to  England  to  finish  his 
education ;  Nicholls  persuaded  him  to  go  to 
Cambridge,  and  gave  him  a  letter  of  intro- 
duction to  Gray.  For  the  first  three  months  of 
1770  Bonstetten  spent  almost  every  evening 
with  Gray,  reading  with  him  Shakespeare, 
Milton,  Dryden,  Pope,  and  other  English 
authors.  On  his  way  back  to  Switzerland 
Bonstetten  stopped  in  London,  and  was  shown 
some  of  the  sights  by  Gray,  among  others  Dr. 
Johnson  himself,  whom  Gray  knew  by  sight, 
but  disliked.  Bonstetten  told  Sir  Egerton 
Brydges,  among  other  anecdotes  of  Gray,  that, 
when  he  was  walking  one  day  with  Gray  in  a 
crowded  street  of  the  city,  "a  large  uncouth 
figure  was  rolling  before  them,  upon  seeing 
which  Gray  exclaimed  with  some  bitterness, 
*  Look,  look,  Bonstetten,  the  great  bear ! 
There  goes  Ursa  Major. ' "  In  addition  to 
interesting  us  as  the  companions  and  corre- 
spondents of  Gray,  Nicholls    and  Bonstetten 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  49 

have  each  written  a  sketch  of  Gray's  character 
and  mode  of  life.  Nicholls'  "  Reminiscences  of 
Gray  "  was  written  in  1805  and  published  in 
Mitford's  edition  in  1843,  and  in  1831  Bonstetten 
wrote  "  Souvenirs  "  of  his  own  life,  in  which  is 
a  most  interesting  account  of  his  intercourse 
with  and  impressions  of  "  le  celebre  poete 
Gray," — quoted  in  Mitford's  "  Correspondence 
of  Gray  and  Mason,"  pp.  480-481. 

An  extract  from  a  letter  from  the  poet 
Beattie  to  Sir  W.  Forbes,  dated  4th  May,  1770, 
shows  the  opinion  then  held  of  Gray  as  a  poet. 
He  writes  :  "  Of  all  the  English  poets  of  this 
age,  Mr.  Gray  is  most  admired,  and,  I  think, 
with  justice.  Yet  there  are,  comparatively 
speaking,  but  a  few  who  know  anything  of  his 
but  his  '  Churchyard  Elegy,"  which  is  by  no 
means  the  best  of  his  works." 

In  the  summer  of  1770  Gray  made  a  tour  in 
company  with  NichoUs  through  Worcestershire, 
Gloucestershire,  Monmouthshire,  Hereford- 
shire, and  Shroi-^hire,  "  five  of  the  most  beauti- 
ful counties  of  the  Kingdom  "  ;  he  descended 
the  Wye  in  a  boat  for  forty  miles,  its  banks  he 
thought  "A  succession  of  nameless  wonders"  ; 
he  also  saw  Tintern  Abbey,  Monmouth,  and 
Oxford. 

This  was  the  last  of  his  tours ;  he  had  looked 
forward  to  accompanying  Nicholls  to  Switzer- 


60  THE  LIFE 

land  on  a  visit  to  his  friend  Bonstetten  in  the 
summer  of  1771,  but  as  the  time  approached  he 
wrote  to  Nicholls  that  he  "  had  neither  health 
nor  spirits  all  the  winter " ;  and,  soon  after, 
"  I  am  but  indifferently  well ;  and  the  sense  of 
my  own  duty  (which  I  do  not  perform),  my 
own  low  spirits,  and,  added  to  these,  a  bodily 
indisposition,  make  it  necessary  for  me  to  deny 
myself  that  pleasure."  This  was  in  the  end  of 
May  ;  on  the  28th  June  he  writes  : — "  I  foresee 
a  new  complaint  that  may  tie  me  down  perhaps 
to  my  bed,  and  expose  me  to  the  operations  of 
a  surgeon.  God  knows  what  will  be  the  end  of 
it."  On  the  24:th  July,  while  at  dinner  in  Pem- 
broke College  Hall  he  was  taken  suddenly  ill ; 
next  day  the  gout  had  reached  his  stomach, 
and  he  died  before  midnight  on  the  30th  July, 
1771. 

In  his  will  Gray  desired  that  his  body  might 
be  "  deposited  in  the  vault,  made  by  my  late 
dear  mother  in  the  churchyard  of  Stoke-Poges, 
near  Slough  in  Buckinghamshire,  by  her  re- 
mains." There  he  was  buried  on  the  6th 
August,  the  grave,  with  its  altar-shaped  tomb- 
stone, being  just  outside  the  chancel  window, 
and  almost  under  the  shadow  of  the  ivy-mantled 
tower.  The  only  inscription  on  the  tombstone 
is  that  which  he  had  put  to  the  memory  of  his 
aunt  and  his  mother ;  but  a  stone  was  placed 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  5I 

by  Mr.  Penu  in  the  wall  of  the  church, 
with  this  inscription  :  "  Opposite  to  this  stone, 
in  the  same  tomb  upon  which  he  has  so  feelingly- 
recorded  his  grief  at  the  loss  of  a  beloved 
parent,  are  deposited  the  remains  of  Thomas 
Gray,  the  author  of  the  Elegy  written  in  a 
Country  Churchyard,  etc.  He  was  buried 
August  6th,  1771." 

In  1778,  on  the  same  day  (6th  August,  the 

anniversary   of    his  funeral),    "monuments  to 

the  memory  of  Spenser  and  Gray  were  opened 

in  Westminster  Abbey."  *     Gray's    monument 

was  erected  by  Mason  ;  it  is  in  Poets'  Corner, 

just  under  the  monument  to  Milton  and  next 

to  that  of  Spenser  ;  it  consists  of  a  medallion 

of  Gray,  and  below  the  following  inscription 

written  by  Mason  : — 

"  No  more  the  Grecian  Muse  unrivalled  reigns, 
To  Britain  let  the  nations  homage  pay  ; 
She  felt  a  Homer's  fire  in  Milton's  strains, 
A  Pindar's  rapture  in  the  lyre  of  Gray. 

He  died  July  30th,  1771.     Aged  54." 

One  defect  in  these  lines  is  that  there  is  as 
much  about  Milton  as  there  is  about  Gray. 

In  1799,  Mr.  John  Penn,  the  owner  of  Stoke 
Park,  caused  a  large  monumental  cenotaph  to 
be  erected  to  Gray's  memory  in  a  field  adjoin- 
ing the  churchyard  at  Stoke.  On  the  four 
*  "  Gentleman's  Magazine,"  1778. 


52  THE  LIFE 

sides  of  the  pedestal  there  are  inscriptions  ;  on 
the  side  facing  the  church  there  are  the  27th 
and  28th  stanzas  of  the  "  Elegy," — the  eight 
lines  beginning  "  Hard  by  yon  wood  "  ;  on  the 
next  side  *  facing  north  are  six  lines  from  the 
"  Ode  on  Eton  College  "  :— 

"  Ye  distant  spires,  ye  antique  towers, 
That  crown  the  watry  glade. 
***** 

Ah  happy  hills,  ah  pleasing  shade, 

Ah  fields  beloved  in  vain, 
Where  once  my  careless  childhood  strayed, 

A  stranger  yet  to  pain  !  " 

On  the  side  *  that  looks  east  are  the  4th  and 
9th  stanzas  from  the  "  Elegy,"  beginning — 

"  Beneath  those  rugged  elms,  that  yew-tree's  shade," 
and 

"  The  boast  of  heraldry,  the  pomp  of  power." 

On  the  fourth  side  there  is  the  following  in- 

*  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  in  Howitt's  "Homes  and 
Haunts  of  the  British  Poets "  the  quotations  on  these 
two  sides  are  incorrectly  given — sixteen  continuous 
lines  being  given  from  the  "  Eton  Ode,"  and  the  4th 
and  5th  stanzas  of  the  "  Elegy"  ;  the  inscription  on 
the  fourth  side  is  also  inaccurately  quoted  ;  and  in 
Mr.  Rolfe's  American  edition  of  Gray's  "  Poems," 
while  he  takes  credit  for  correcting  Howitt,  he  also, 
in  his  revised  edition,  gives  the  wrong  verse  from  the 
"Elegy." 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  53 

scription  : — "  This  Monument,  in  honour  of 
Thomas  Gray,  was  erected  a.  d.  1799,  among 
the  scenes  celebrated  by  that  great  Lyric 
and  Elegiac  Poet.  He  died  July  31,*  1771,  and 
lies  unnoted,  in  the  churchyard  adjoining, 
under  the  tombstone  on  which  he  piously  and 
pathetically  recorded  the  interment  of  his  Aunt 
and  lamented  Mother." 

In  Eton  College  a  bust  of  Gray,  by  Behnes, 
presented  by  the  seventh  Earl  of  Carlisle,  stands 
among  the  busts  of  famous  Etonians  in  the 
upper  school.  And  to  further  mark  the  poet's 
connection  with  Eton,  the  present  Head-Master, 
Kev.  E.  Warre,  D.  D.  (following  the  example 
of  his  predecessors.  Dr.  Ealston  and  Dr.  Horn- 
by) presents  a  copy  of  Gray's  Poems  to  each 
boy  in  the  fifth  and  sixth  forms  who  leaves 
Eton  with  a  '  bene  discessit,'  and  a  handsomely- 
bound  large  edition  to  such  as  may  have  spe- 
cially distinguished  themselves.f 

It  was  not  till  just  a  century  after  his  death 
that  at  Cambridge  due  honour  was  done  to  the 
memory  of  Gray.     When  the  College  Hall  at 

*  This  wrong  date  is  also  given  in  several  biographies 
of  Gray,  owing  to  Mason's  wording  in  his  "  Memoirs '' 
— "  On  the  30th  the  fit  returned  with  increased  vio- 
lence, and  on  the  next  evening  he  expired." 

t  Dr.  Goodford's  "  leaving  book  "  was  a  "Terence," 
Dr.  Hawtrey's  a  "  Juvenal  "  ;  and  in  1862  Dr.  Balston 
adopted  "  Gray  "  as  the  presentation  book. 


22—  G  &  G— Q 


54  THE  LIFE 

Peterhouse  was  restored  in  1870  a  stained  glass 
window,  drawn  by  Mr.  F.  Madox  Brown,  was 
presented  by  Mr.  Hunt;  and  at  Pembroke 
College  a  marble  bust  by  Thornycroft  was  un- 
veiled by  Lord  Houghton  on  the  26th  May, 
1885,  and  speeches  were  delivered  in  honour  of 
the  poet  by  Sir  Frederick  Leighton  and  by  Mr. 
Russell  Lowell,  the  American  Minister  and 
himself  a  poet. 

Gray's  character  is  best  painted  by  himself  ; 
writing  to  West  from  Florence,  in  April,  1741, 
he  says :  "  As  I  am  recommending  myself  to 
your  love,  methinks  I  ought  to  send  you  my 
picture.  You  must  add  then,  to  your  former 
idea,  two  years  of  age,  a  reasonable  quantity  of 
dulness,  a  great  deal  of  silence,  and  something 
that  rather  resembles,  than  is,  thinking  ;  a 
confused  notion  of  many  strange  and  fine 
things  that  have  swam  before  my  eyes  for 
some  time,  a  want  of  love  for  general  society, 
indeed  an  inability  to  it.  On  the  good  side 
you  may  add  a  sensibility  for  what  others  feel, 
and  indulgence  for  their  faults  and  weaknesses, 
a  love  of  truth  and  detestation  of  everything 
else.  Then  you  are  to  deduct  a  little  imper- 
tinence, a  little  laughter,  a  great  deal  of  pride 
and  some  spirits." 

"  To  be  employed  is  to  be  happy,"  was  one  of 
Gray's  favourite  maxims.     Study  and   travel 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  55 

were  the  two  kinds  of  employment  in  which  he 
found  most  happiness.  In  a  letter  to  Wharton 
(April,  1760)  he  writes  "  To  find  oneself  busi- 
ness, I  am  persuaded,  is  the  great  art  of  life ; 
and  I  am  never  so  angry  as  when  I  hear  my 
acquaintance  wishing  they  had  been  bred  to 
some  poking  profession,  or  employed  in  some  of- 
fice of  drudgery,  as  if  it  were  pleasanter  to  be 
at  the  command  of  others,  than  at  one's  own, 
and  as  if  they  could  not  go  unless  they  were 
wound  up.  Yet  I  know  and  feel  what  they 
mean  by  this  complaint ;  it  proves  that  some 
spirit,  something  of  genius  (more  than  common) 
is  required  to  teach  a  man  how  to  employ 
himself." 

Probably  the  trait  in  Gray's  character  most 
natural  in  the  author  of  the  "  Elegy  "  is  his 
sympathy  for  the  sufferings  of  others,  his 
"  sensibility,"  as  he  calls  it,  to  know  and  feel 
another's  woe.  Whenever  there  was  sorrow, 
or  sickness,  or  death,  among  his  friends,  his 
tenderness  was  shown  in  language  no  less 
touching  than  beautiful ;  his  letters  of  condo- 
lence to  Mason  on  the  death  of  his  wife,  and 
to  Nicholls  on  the  loss  of  his  mother  are  well 
known.  To  him  sorrow  had  not  come  for  no 
purpose  ;  "  methinks,"  he  writes,  "  I  can  readily 
pardon  sickness,  and  age,  and  vexation  for  all 
the  depredations  they  make  within  and  with- 


66  THE  LIFE 

out  when  I  think  they  make  us  better  friends 
and  better  men,  which  I  am  persuaded  is  often 
the  case.  I  am  very  sure  I  have  seen  the  best- 
tempered,  generous,  tenderest,  young  creatures 
in  the  world,  that  would  have  been  very  glad 
to  be  sorry  for  people  they  liked  when  under 
any  pain,  and  could  not,  merely  for  the  want 
of  knowing  rightly  what  it  was  themselves." 

Unjust  and  disparaging  as  is  Dr.  Johnson's 
criticism  of  Gray's  poetry,  his  estimate  of  his 
character  is,  for  a  contemporary,  wonderfully 
true;  "his  mind,"  he  says,  "  had  a  large 
grasp ;  his  curiosity  was  unlimited,  and  his 
judgment  cultivated  ;  he  was  a  man  likely  to 
love  much  where  he  loved  at  all,  but  he  was 
fastidious  and  hard  to  please ;  his  contempt, 
however,  is  often  employed,  where  I  hope  it 
will  be  approved,  on  scepticism  and  infidelity." 

"  It  is  scarcely  a  paradox  to  say,"  writes  Mr. 
Tovey,  "  that  he  has  left  much  that  is  incom- 
plete, but  nothing  that  is  unfinished.  His 
handwriting  represents  his  mind  ;  I  have  seen 
and  transcribed  many  and  many  a  page  of  it, 
but  I  do  not  recollect  a  single  carelessly  written 
word,  or  even  letter.  The  mere  sight  of  it  sug- 
gests refinement,  order,  and  infinite  pains.  A 
mind  searching  in  so  many  directions,  sensitive 
to  so  many  influences,  yet  seeking  in  the  first 
place  its  own  satisfaction  in  a  manner  uniformly 


ATSTD  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  57 

careful  and  artistic,  is  almost  foredoomed  to 
give  very  little  to  the  world.  But  what  he  has 
given  is  a  little  gold  instead  of  much  sil- 
ver  In  all  that  he  has  left,  there  is  in- 
dependence, sincerity,  thoroughness  ;  the  high- 
est exemplar  of  the  critical  spirit,  a  type  of 
how  good  work  of  any  kind  should  be  done. 

He  studied  Greek  when  few  studied  it 

His  notes  designed  for  his  own  use,  have  been 
frequently   quoted     by   the    late    Master    of 

Trinity To    History   he   brought    the 

modern  spirit  of  research.  .  .  .  His  critical 
opinions  are  safe,  because  they  are  not  contro- 
versial nor  addressed  to  a  public,  but  the  out- 
come of  impressions  gathered  at  leisure  by  a 
mind  at  once  comprehensive  and  exact.  We 
are  no  losers  by  the  circumstance  that  they 
were  communicated  only  to  his  friends,  for 
next  in  sincerity  to  the  good  criticism  which 
may  be  found  in  some  poetry  is  that  which  we 
can  extract  from  private  letters." 

Gray  was  skilled  in  architecture,  in  botany, 
in  zoology,  and  in  music ;  he  made  a  valuable 
collection  of  manuscript  music  while  he  was 
in  Italy,  and  was  a  judge  of  both  painting  and 
sculpture.  In  relation  to  landscape  Gray  was 
a  prophet  and  a  precursor  of  all  that  we  love 
and  admire.  Speaking  as  an  artist  Sir  F. 
Leighton  well  said  : — "  Nature  knew  him  for 


58  THE  LIFE 

her  lover  and  unsealed  for  him  her  inmost 
secrets.  Her  beauty  revealed  to  him  new  and 
richer  meanings,  a  fuller  charm  breathed  for 
him  out  of  the  meadow,  and  out  of  the  mere, 
and  the  mountains  lost  their  antique  gloom 
and  let  in  a  new  day,  their  gloom  was  turned 
before  his  eyes  to  glory." 

One  of  the  first  things  that  strikes  one  with 
reference  to  the  Poetry  of  Gray  is  the  small 
quantity  of  it ;  as  Dickens  once  said,  no  poet 
ever  gained  a  place  among  the  immortals  with 
so  small  a  volume  under  his  arm.  But  Gray 
wrote  only  for  himself  or  his  friends,  and  it 
was  merely  when  pressed  by  them  or  by  the 
booksellers  that  he  published  anything ;  the 
"  Elegy  "  was  being  circulated  in  manuscript 
for  months,  and  it  was  only  when  it  was  about 
to  be  printed  in  an  unauthorized  manner  that 
he  caused  it  to  be  published,  and  even  then 
without  his  name.  What  he  says  of  his  verses 
was  true  of  himself — 

"  To  censure  cold  and  negligent  of  fame." 

Nor  did  he  w^rite  for  money ;  "  he  could  not 
bear,"  we  are  told,  "  to  be  thought  a  professed 
man  of  letters,  but  wished  to  be  regarded  as  a 
private  gentleman  who  read  for  his  amuse- 
ment." 

The  chief  characteristics  of  Gray's  Poetry 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  59 

are  musical  sweetness  of  the  versification  and 
his  felicity  of  expression,  and  besides  these  a 
"philosophic  pathos,"  to  use  Coleridge's  phrase 
in  describing  one  of  the  excellences  of  the 
poetry  of  Wordsworth.  "Extreme  concise- 
ness of  expression,  yet  pure,  perspicuous,  and 
musical,  is  one  of  the  grand  beauties  of  lyric 
poetry.  This,"  says  Gray,  "  I  have  always 
aimed  at  and  never  could  attain.  The  neces- 
sity of  rhyming  is  one  great  obstacle  to  it." 

His  chief  merit  as  a  poet,  however,  lies  in  his 
art.  "  Gray,"  writes  Matthew  Arnold,  "  holds 
his  high  rank  as  a  poet,  not  merely  by  the 
beauty  and  grace  of  passages  in  his  poems; 
not  merely  by  a  diction  generally  pure  in  an 
age  of  impure  diction  ;  he  holds  it,  above  all, 
by  the  power  and  skill  with  which  the  evolu- 
tion of  his  poems  is  conducted.  Here  is  his 
grand  superiority  to  Collins,  whose  diction  in 
his  best  poem— the  "Ode  to  Evening"— is 
purer  than  Gray's  ;  but  then  the  "  Ode  to  Eve- 
nino-"  is  like  a  river  which  loses  itself  in  the 
sand,  whereas  Gray's  best  poems  have  an  evolu- 
tion sure  and  satisfying."  * 

Dryden  and  Milton  seem  to  be  the  poets  from 
whom  Gray  chiefly  formed  his  style ;  he  cites 
Milton  as  the  "  best  example  of  an  exquisite 
ear  that  he  can  produce";  and  he  seems  to  me 

*  Evierson.     "  Macmillan's  Magazine,"  May,  1884. 


60  THE  LIFE 

to  have  borrowed  more  of  the  language  and 
phraseology  of  Milton  than  that  of  any  other 
poet ;  and  of  Dryden  he  writes  that  "  if  there 
was  any  excellence  in  his  own  numbers  he  had 
learned  it  wholly  from  that  great  poet."  Nor- 
ton Nicholls  writes  :  "  Spenser  was  among  his 
favourite  poets,  and  he  told  me  he  never  sat 
down  to  compose  poetry  without  reading  Spen- 
ser for  a  considerable  time  previously.  He 
admired  Dryden  and  could  not  patiently  hear 
him  criticized  ;  "  Absalom  and  Achitophel  " 
and  "  Theodore  and  Honoria "  stood  in  the 
first  rank  of  poems  in  his  estimation.  He 
placed  Shakespeare  high  above  all  poets  of  all 
countries  and  all  ages.  ...  1  asked  him  why 
he  had  not  continued  that  beautiful  fragment 
beginning 

"  As  sickly  plants  betray  a  niggard  earth,"  * 

he  said  '  because  he  could  not ' ;  when  I  ex- 
pressed surprise  at  this,  he  explained  himself 
as  follows,  that  he  had  been  used  to  write  only 
lyric  poetry,  in  which  the  poems  being  short, 
he  had  accustomed  himself,  and  was  able  to 
polish  every  part ;  that  this  having  become 
habit  he  could  not  write  otherwise,  and  that 
the  labour  of  this  method  in  a  long  poem  would 


*    »4 


Alliance  of  Education  and  Government." 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  61 

be  intolerable He  thought  Goldsmith  a 

genuine  poet.  I  was  with  him  at  Malvern 
when  he  received  the  "Deserted  Village," 
which  he  desired  me  to  read  to  him ;  and  he 
listened  with  fixed  attention,  and  soon  ex- 
claimed, '  This  man  is  a  poet.'  " 

A  point  which  I  have  nowhere  seen  noted  in 
connection  with  Gray's  style  is  the  frequency 
with  which  he  uses  a  word  or  phrase  that 
seems  to  please  him,  several  instances  of  which 
I  have  cited  in  the  Notes.  Another  (to  which 
I  have  referred  in  the  note  on  line  63  of  the 
"  Elegy ")  Is  his  reproducing  in  his  printed 
poems  words  and  thoughts  from  the  verses  that 
he  set  aside  and  never  intended  for  publication. 
I  have  cited  several  such  from  "Agrippina," 
and  there  are  others  in  his  Translations, — that 
remarkable  expression  "luxury  of  light,"  in  the 
"  Stanzas  to  Bentley,"  he  had  already  written 
in  his  Translation  from  Tasso  so  long  previously 
as  1738 ;  and  his  "  Alliance  of  Education  and 
Government  "  contains  several  words  used  in  a 
connection  almost  peculiar  to  Gray,  e.g.^  that 
most  unpoetical  word  "circumscribed"  (famil- 
iar from  the  "  Elegy ")  occurs  in  a  passage 
that  may  be  quoted  as  a  specimen  of  the  poetry 
which  he  did  not  think  worth  publishing — 

"  Unmanly  thought  !  what  seasons  can  control, 
What  fancied  zone  can  circumscribe  the  Soul, 


62  THE  LIFE 

Who,  conscious   of  the    source  from    whence   she 

springs, 
By  reason's  light  on  resolution's  wings, 
Spite  of  her  frail  companion  dauntless  goes 
O'er  Libya's  deserts  and  through  Zerabla's  snows  ? 
She  bids  each  slumb'ring  energy  awake, 
Another  touch,  another  temper  take, 
Suspends  th'  inferior  laws  that  rule  our  clay  ; 
The  stubborn  elements  confess  her  sway. 
Their  little  wants,  their  low  desires  refine, 
And  raise  the  mortal  to  a  height  divine." 

Another  peculiarity  of  Gray's  is  his  use  of 
compounds,  not  merely  such  as  "  many-twink- 
ling "  and  "  ivy-mantled,"  but  "  desert-beach," 
"  vermeil-cheek,"  "  iron-sleep,"  "  iron-sleet," 
"virgin-grace,"  "  tyrant-povrer,"  "velvet-green," 
and  others  in  which  the  second  part  as  well  as 
the  whole  word  is  a  substantive. 

The  principal  defects  in  Gray's  poetry  are 
an  excess  of  allegory  and  rhetoric,  and  a  too 
frequent  recurrence  of  personification,  some- 
times so  vague  that,  as  Coleridge  observes  in 
his  remarks  on  the  well-known  passage  in  the 
"  Bard  " — "  Youth  on  the  prow  and  Pleasure  at 
the  helm  " — "  it  depends  wholly  in  the  com- 
positor's putting  or  not  putting  a  capital,  both 
in  this  and  many  other  passages,  whether  the 
words  should  be  personifications  or  mere 
abstracts." 

The  charge  of  obscurity  is  less  likely  to  be 
made  in  the  present  day  than  it  was  when  his 


AND  WRITINGS  OF  GRAY.  63 

Pindaric  Odes  appeared,  when  notes  were 
necessary  "  to  tell  the  gentle  reader,"  as  Gray 
says,  "  that  Edward  I.  was  not  Oliver  Crom- 
well nor  Queen  Elizabeth  the  Witch  of  Endor  "  ; 
but  if  such  there  be,  his  own  motto  to  the 
"  Odes  "  is  his  reply,  "  Vocal  to  the  intelligent, 
for  the  many  they  need  interpreters  "  ;  or,  as 
Coleridge  said  to  those  who  complained  of  his 
poems  being  obscure,  "  If  any  man  expect  from 
my  poems  the  same  easiness  of  style  which  he 
admires  in  a  drinking  song,  for  him  I  have  not 
written.    Intelligibilia,  non  intellectum  adf ei'o." 


POEMS. 


The  footnotes  are  by  Gray ;  those  to  the  first  ten 
pieces  being  taken  from  his  edition  published  by  Dods- 
ley  in  1768.  The  line,  etc.,  where  a  quotation  is  to  be 
found  is  here  added,  though  seldom  giveu  by  Gray. 


ODE  ON  THE  SPRING. 

Lo !  where  the  rosy -bosomed  Hours, 

Fair  Venus'  train,  appear, 
Disclose  the  long-expecting  flowers, 

And  wake  the  purple  year  ! 
The  Attic  warbler  pours  her  throat, 
Responsive  to  the  cuckoo's  note, 

The  untaught  harmony  of  spring ; 
While,  whispering  pleasure  as  they  fly. 
Cool  Zephyrs  thro'  the  clear  blue  sky 

Their  gathered  fragrance  fling.  10 

Where'er  the  oak's  thick  branches  stretch 

A  broader  browner  shade. 
Where'er  the  rude  and  moss-grown  beech 

O'er-canopies  the  glade, 

14.  "  —  a  bank  .... 

O'ercanopied  with  luscious  woodbine." 

Midsummer  Night's  Dream,  11.  2. 

67 


68  ODE  ON  THE  SPRING. 

Beside  some  water's  rushy  brink 
Witti  me  the  Muse  shall  sit,  and  think 

(At  ease  reclined  in  rustic  state) 
How  vain  the  ardour  of  the  crowd, 
How  low,  how  little  are  the  proud, 

How  indigent  the  great !  20 

Still  is  the  toiling  hand  of  Care ; 

The  panting  herds  repose  ; 
Yet  hark,  how  through  the  peopled  air 

The  busy  murmur  glows ! 
The  insect  youth  are  on  the  wing, 
Eager  to  taste  the  honied  spring. 

And  float  amid  the  liquid  noon  ; 
Some  lightly  o'er  the  current  skim, 
Some  show  their  gaily-gilded  trim 

Quick-glancing  to  the  sun.  30 

To  Contemplation's  sober  eye 
Such  is  the  race  of  Man  ; 

27.  "  Nare  per  sestatem  liquidam." 

Virgil,  Georgic,  iv.  59. 

30.  "  .   .    .    .  sporting  with  quick  glance 
Show  to  the  sun  their  waved  coats  dropped 

with  gold."— Par.  Lost,  vii.  405. 

31.  "While  insects  from  the  threshold  preach,"   etc. 
M.  Green,  in  the  Grotto.    Dodsley's  Miscellanies,  v.  161. 


ODE  ON  THE  SPRING.  69 

And  they  that  creep,  and  they  that  fly, 

Shall  end  where  they  began. 
Alike  the  Busy  and  the  Gay 
But  flutter  through  life's  little  day, 

In  fortune's  varying  colours  drest ; 
Brushed  by  the  hand  of  rough  Mischance, 
Or  chilled  by  age,  their  airy  dance 

They  leave,  in  dust  to  rest.  40 

Methinks  I  hear  in  accents  low 

The  sportive  kind  reply : 
Poor  moralist !  and  what  art  thou  ? 

A  solitary  fly ! 
Thy  joys  no  glittering  female  meets, 
No  hive  hast  thou  of  hoarded  sweets, 

No  painted  plumage  to  display  ; 
On  hasty  wings  thy  youth  is  flown 
Thy  sun  is  set,  thy  spring  is  gone — 

We  frolic,  while  'tis  May.  50 


70        ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF 


11. 

ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A  FAYOUKITE 

CAT, 

DROWNED  IN  A  TUB  OF  GOLD  FISHES. 

'TwAS  on  a  lofty  vase's  side, 
Where  China's  gayest  art  had  dyed 

The  azure  flowers,  that  blow  ; 
Demurest  of  the  tabby  kind. 
The  pensive  Selima,  reclined, 

Gazed  on  the  lake  below.  6 

Her  conscious  tail  her  joy  declared  ; 
The  fair  round  face,  the  snowy  beard, 

The  velvet  of  her  paws. 
Her  coat,  that  with  the  tortoise  vies, 
Her  ears  of  jet,  and  emerald  eyes. 

She  saw  ;  and  purred  applause.  12 

Still  had  she  gazed  ;  but  'midst  the  tide 
Two  angel  forms  were  seen  to  glide, 

The  Genii  of  the  stream  ; 
Their  scaly  armour's  Tyrian  hue 


A  FAVOURITE  CAT.  71 

Through  richest  purple  to  the  view 

Betrayed  a  golden  gleam.  18 

The  hapless  nymph  with  wonder  saw ; 
A  whisker  first  and  then  a  claw, 

With  many  an  ardent  wish, 
She  stretched  in  vain  to  reach  the  prize. 
What  female  heart  can  gold  despise  ? 

What  Cat's  averse  to  fish  ?  24 

Presumptuous  maid  !  with  looks  intent 
Again  she  stretched,  again  she  bent. 

Nor  knew  the  gulf  between. 
(Malignant  Fate  sat  by,  and  smiled) 
The  slippery  verge  her  feet  beguiled, 

She  tumbled  headlong  in.  30 

Eight  times  emerging  from  the  flood 
She  mewed  to  every  wat'ry  god, 

Some  speedy  aid  to  send. 
No  Dolphin  came,  no  Nereid  stirred ; 
Nor  cruel  Tom,  nor  Susan  heard. 

A  fav'rite  has  no  friend !  36 

From  hence,  ye  Beauties,  undeceived. 
Know,  one  false  step  is  ne'er  retrieved, 
And  be  with  caution  bold. 


72  ODE  ON  A  DISTANT 

Not  all  that  tempts  your  wand'ring  eyes 
And  heedless  hearts  is  lawful  prize ; 
JSTor  all,  that  glisters,  gold.  42 


III. 


ODE  ON  A  DISTANT  PROSPECT  OF 
ETON  COLLEGE. 

Ye  distant  spires,  ye  antique  towers, 

That  crown  the  wat'ry  glade, 
"Where  grateful  Science  still  adores 

Her  Henry's  holy  Shade  ; 
And  ye,  that  from  the  stately  brow 
Of  Windsor's  heights  the  expanse  below 

Of  grove,  of  lawn,  of  mead  survey, 
"Whose  turf,  whose  shade,  whose  flowers  among 
"Wanders  the  hoary  Thames  along 

His  silver-winding  way.  10 

Ah  happy  hills,  ah  pleasing  shade. 

Ah  fields  beloved  in  vain, 
"Where  once  my  careless  childhood  strayed, 

A  stranger  yet  to  pain  ! 

4.  King  Henry  the  Sixth,  Founder  of  the  College. 


PROSPECT  OF  ETON  COLLEGE.      73 

I  feel  the  gales,  that  from  ye  blow, 
A  momentary  bliss  bestow, 

As  waving  fresh  their  gladsome  wing 
My  weary  soul  they  seem  to  soothe. 
And,  redolent  of  joy  and  youth. 

To  breathe  a  second  spring.  20 

Say,  Father  Thames,  for  thou  hast  seen 

Full  many  a  sprightly  race 
Disporting  on  thy  margent  green 

The  paths  of  pleasure  trace, 
Who  foremost  now  delight  to  cleave 
"With  pliant  arm  thy  glassy  wave  ? 

The  captive  linnet  which  enthrall  ? 
What  idle  progeny  succeed 
To  chase  the  rolling  circle's  speed, 

Or  urge  the  flying  ball  ?  30 

While  some  on  earnest  business  bent 

Their  murmuring  labours  ply 
'Gainst  graver  hours,  that  bring  constraint 

To  sweeten  liberty  ; 

19.  "  And  bees  their  honey  redolent  of  spring." 
Dryden's  Fable  on  the  Pythagorean  System. 


74  ODE  ON  A  DISTANT 

Some  bold  adventurers  disdain 
The  limits  of  their  little  reign, 

And  unknown  regions  dare  descry ; 
Still  as  they  run  they  look  behind, 
They  hear  a  voice  in  every  wind, 

And  snatch  a  fearful  joy.  40 

Gay  hope  is  theirs  by  fancy  fed, 

Less  pleasing  when  possest ; 
The  tear  forgot  as  soon  as  shed, 

The  sunshine  of  the  breast ; 
Theirs  buxom  health  of  rosy  hue, 
"Wild  wit,  invention  ever-new, 

And  lively  cheer  of  vigour  born ; 
The  thoughtless  day,  the  easy  night. 
The  spirits  pure,  the  slumbers  light, 

That  fly  th'  approach  of  morn.  60 

Alas,  regardless  of  their  doom. 

The  little  victims  play  ! 
No  sense  have  they  of  ills  to  come, 

Nor  care  beyond  to-da}^ ; 
Yet  see  how  all  around  'em  wait 
The  Ministers  of  human  fate. 

And  black  Misfortune's  baleful  train  ! 
Ah,  show  them  where  in  ambush  stand. 


PROSPECT  OF  ETON  COLLEGE.  75 

To  seize  their  prey,  the  murtherous  band ! 
Ah,  tell  them,  they  are  men  !  60 

These  shall  the  fury  Passions  tear, 

The  vultures  of  the  mind, 
Disdainful  Anger,  pallid  Fear, 

And  Shame  that  skulks  behind  ; 
Or  pining  Love  shall  waste  their  youth, 
Or  Jealousy  with  rankling  tooth. 

That  inly  gnaws  the  secret  heart, 
And  Envy  wan,  and  faded  Care, 
Grim-visaged  comfortless  Despair, 

And  Sorrow's  piercing  dart.  70 

Ambition  this  shall  tempt  to  rise. 

Then  whirl  the  wretch  from  high, 
To  bitter  Scorn  a  sacrifice. 

And  grinning  Infamy. 
The  stings  of  Falsehood  those  shall  try, 
And  hard  Unkindness'  altered  eye, 

That  mocks  the  tear  it  forced  to  flow  ; 
And  keen  Remorse  with  blood  defiled, 
And  moody  Madness  laughing  wild 

Amid  severest  woe.  80 

79.     "Madness  laughing  in  his  ireful  mood." 
Dryden's  Fable  of  Palamon  and  Arcite,  ii.  43 


76  ODE  ON  ETON  COLLEGa 

Lo !  in  the  vale  of  years  beneath 

A  grisly  troop  are  seen, 
The  painful  family  of  Death, 

More  hideous  than  their  queen. 
This  racks  the  joints,  this  fires  the  veins, 
That  every  labouring  sinew  strains, 

Those  in  the  deeper  vitals  rage ; 
Lo,  Poverty,  to  fill  the  band. 
That  numbs  the  soul  with  icy  hand. 

And  slow-consuming  Age.  90 

To  each  his  sufferings  ;  all  are  men, 

Condemned  alike  to  groan, 
The  tender  for  another's  pain. 

The  unfeeling  for  his  own. 
Yet  ah  !  why  should  they  know  their  fate  ? 
Since  sorrow  never  comes  too  late. 

And  happiness  too  swiftly  flies. 
Thought  would  destroy  their  paradise. 
Ko  more ;  where  ignorance  is  bliss, 

'Tis  folly  to  be  wise.  lOd 


HYMN  TO  ADVERSITY.  77 


TV. 
HYMN  TO  ADVEKSITY. 

Daughter  of  Jove,  relentless  Power, 
Thou  Tamer  of  the  human  breast, 
Whose  iron  scourge  and  torturing  hour 

The  bad  affright,  afflict  the  best ! 
Bound  in  thy  adamantine  chain 
The  proud  are  taught  to  taste  of  pain. 
And  purple  tyrants  vainly  groan 
With  pangs  unfelt  before,  un pitied  and  alone.  8 

When  first  thy  Sire  to  send  on  earth 
Virtue,  his  darling  child,  designed, 
To  thee  he  gave  the  heavenly  birth, 
And  bad  to  form  her  infant  mind. 
Stern  rugged  Nurse !  thy  rigid  lore 
With  patience  many  a  year  she  bore  ; 
What  sorrow  was,  thou  bad'st  her  know, 
And  from  her  own  she  learned  to  melt  at 
others'  woe.  16 


22— G  &  G  — B 


78  HYMN  TO  ADVERSITY. 

Scared  at  thy  frown  terrific,  fly 

Self-pleasing  Folly's  idle  brood, 
"Wild  Laughter,  Noise,  and  thoughtless  Joy, 

And  leave  us  leisure  to  be  good. 
Light  they  disperse,  and  with  them  go 
The  summer  friend,  the  flattering  foe  ; 
By  vain  Prosperity  received. 
To  her  they  vow  their  truth,  and  are  again 
believed.  24 

"Wisdom  in  sable  garb  arrayed, 

Immersed  in  rapturous  thought  profound, 
And  Melancholy,  silent  maid 

"With  leaden  eye,  that  loves  the  ground. 
Still  on  thy  solemn  steps  attend  ; 
"Warm  Charity,  the  general  friend, 
With  Justice  to  herself  severe,  31 

And    Pity,  dropping  soft   the   sadly-pleasing 
tear. 

Oh,  gently  on  thy  suppliant's  head, 
Dread  Goddess,  lay  thy  chastening  hand  ! 

Not  in  thy  Gorgon  terrors  clad, 
Nor  circled  with  the  vengeful  band 


HYMN  TO  ADVERSITY.  79 

(As  by  the  impious  thou  art  seen) 
"With    thundering    voice,    and    threatening 
mien,  39 

With  screaming  Horror's  funeral  cry, 
Despair,  and  fell   Disease,  and   ghastly   Pov- 
erty, 

Thy  form  benign,  oh  Goddess,  wear, 

Thy  milder  influence  impart, 
Thy  philosophic  train  be  there 

To  soften,  not  to  wound  my  heart, 
The  generous  spark  extinct  revive. 
Teach  me  to  love  and  to  forgive,   ^ 
Exact  my  own  defects  to  scan,  47 

What  others  are,  to  feel,  and  know  myself  a 
Man. 


80  THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 


V. 

THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

A   PINDARIC    ODE. 
I.    1. 

Awake,  JEolian  lyre,  awake, 
And  give  to  rapture  all  thy  trembling  strings. 
From  Helicon's  harmonious  springs 

A  thousand  rills  their  mazy  progress  take ; 
The  laughing  flowers,  that  round  them  blow, 
Drink  life  and  fragrance  as  they  flow. 

1.  "Awake,  my  glory  ;  awake,  lute  and  harp." 

David's  Psalms. 

Pindar  styles  his  own  poetry,  with  its  musical  accom- 
paniments, -iEolian  song,  ^olian  strings,  the  breath  of 
the  ^olian  fiute. 

The  subject  and  simile,  as  usual  with  Pindar,  are 
united.  The  various  sources  of  poetry,  which  gives  life 
and  lustre  to  all  it  touches,  are  here  described ;  its 
quiet  majestic  progress  enriching  every  subject  (other- 
wise dry  and  barren)  with  a  pomp  of  diction  and  luxuri- 
ant harmony  of  numbers ;  and  its  more  rapid  and  irre- 
sistible course,  when  swollen  and  hurried  away  by  the 
conflict  of  tumultuous  passions. 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  81 

Now  the  rich  stream  of  music  winds  along, 

Deep,  majestic,  smooth,  and  strong. 

Through    verdant    vales,  and    Ceres'   golden 

reign ; 
Now  rolling  down  the  steep  amain,  10 

Headlong,  impetuous,  see  it  pour  ; 
The  rocks  and  nodding  groves  rebellow  to  the 

roar. 

I.  2. 

Oh !  Sovereign  of  the  willing  soul, 
Parent  of  sweet  and  solemn-breathing  airs. 
Enchanting  shell !  the  sullen  Cares 

And  frantic  Passions  hear  thy  soft  control. 
On  Thracia's  hills  the  Lord  of  War 
Has  curbed  the  fury  of  his  car, 
And  dropped  his  thirsty  lance  at  thy  command. 
Perching  on  the  sceptred  hand  20 

Of  Jove,  thy  magic  lulls  the  feathered  king 
With  ruffled  plumes  and  flagging  wing ; 

13 — 24.  Power  of  harmony  to  calm  the  turbulent  sal- 
lies of  the  soul.  The  thoughts  are  borrowed  from  the 
first  Pythian  of  Pindar. 

20.  This  is  a  weak  imitation  of  some  incomparable 
lines  in  the  same  Ode. 


82  THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

Quenched  in  dark  clouds  of  slumber  lie 
The  terror  of  his  beak,  and  lightnings  of  his 
eye. 

I.  3. 

Thee  the  voice,  the  dance,  obey, 

Tempered  to  thy  warbled  lay. 

O'er  Idalia's  velvet-green 

The  rosy-crowned  Loves  are  seen 

On  Cytherea's  day 

"With  antic  Sports,  and  blue-eyed  Pleasures,    30 

Frisking  light  in  frolic  measures ; 

Now  pursuing,  now  retreating, 

Now  in  circling  troops  they  meet ; 
To  brisk  notes  in  cadence  beating 

Glance  their  many-twinkling  feet. 
Slow  melting  strains  their  Queen's  approach 
declare; 

"Where'er  she  turns  the  Graces  homage  pay. 
"With  arms  sublime,  that  float  upon  the  air, 

In  gliding  state  she  wins  her  easy  way  ; 

O'er  her  warm  cheek,  and  rising  bosom,  move 

The  bloom  of  young  Desire,  and  purple  light  of 

Love.  41 

25—41.    Power  of  harmony  to  produce  all  the  graces 
of  motion  in  the  body. 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  83 

II.  1. 

Man's  feeble  race  what  ills  await ! 
Labour,  and  Penury,  the  racks  of  pain, 
Disease,  and  Sorrow's  weeping  train, 

And  Death,  sad  refuge  from  the  storms  of 
Fate! 
The  fond  complaint,  my  Song,  disprove. 
And  justify  the  laws  of  Jove. 
Say,  has  he  given  in  vain  the  heavenly  Muse  ? 
Night,  and  all  her  sickly  dews, 
Her  spectres  wan,  and  birds  of  boding  cry,   50 
He  gives  to  range  the  dreary  sky  ; 
Till  down  the  eastern  cliffs  afar 
Hyperion's  march  they  spy,  and  glittering 
shafts  of  war. 

II.  2. 

In  climes  beyond  the  solar  road, 

Where  shaggy  forms  o'er  ice-built  mountains 

roam, 

42 — 53,     To  compensate  the  real  and  imaginary  ills 
of  life,  the  Muse  was   given  to  mankind  by  the  same 
Providence  that  sends  the  day,  by  its  cheerful  presence, 
to  dispel  the  gloom  and  terrors  of  the  night. 
52.     "  Or  seen  the  Morning's  well-appointed  Star 
Come  marching  up  the  eastern  hills  afar." 

Cowley. 


84  THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

The  Muse  has  broke  the  twilight  gloom 

To  cheer  the  shivering  Native's  dull  abode. 
And  oft,  beneath  the  odorous  shade 
Of  Chili's  boundless  forests  laid, 
She  deigns  to  hear  the  savage  youth  repeat,  60 
In  loose  numbers  wildly  sweet, 
Their    feather-cinctured    Chiefs,    and    dusky 

Loves. 
Her  track,  where'er  the  Goddess  roves, 
Glory  pursue,  and  generous  Shame, 
The  unconquerable  Mind,  and  Freedom's  holy 

flame. 

11.  2. 

"Woods,  that  wave  o'er  Delphi's  steep, 
Isles,  that  crown  theJEgean  deep, 

54 — 65.  Extensive  influence  of  poetic  genius  over 
the  remotest  and  most  uncivilized  nations  :  its  connec- 
tion with  liberty,  and  the  virtues  that  naturally  attend 
on  it.  (See  the  Erse,  Norwegian,  and  Welsh  frag- 
ments, the  Lapland  and  American  songs.) 
54.  "  Extra  anni  solisque  vias." 

Virgil,  u^neid,  vi.  795. 
"  Tutta  lontana  dal  camin  del  sole." 

Petrarch,  Canzon,  2. 
66—82.    Progress  of  Poetry  from  Greece  to  Italy,  and 
from  Italy  to  England.    Chaucer  was  not  imacquainted 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  85 

Fields,  that  cool  Ilissus  laves, 

Or  where  Maeander's  amber  waves 
In  lingering  labyrinths  creep,  70 

How  do  your  tuneful  echoes  languish, 

Mute,  but  to  the  voice  of  Anguish  ? 
"Where  each  old  poetic  mountain 

Inspiration  breathed  around ; 
Every  shade  and  hallowed  fountain 

Murmured  deep  a  solemn  sound ; 
Till  the  sad  Nine  in  Greece's  evil  hour 

Left  their  Parnassus  for  the  Latian  plains. 
Alike  they  scorn  the  pomp  of  tyrant-Power, 

And  coward  Vice,  that  revels  in  her  chains. 
When  Latium  had  her  lofty  spirit  lost. 
They  sought,  oh  Albion  !  next  thy  sea-encircled 
coast.  82 

III.  1. 

Far  from  the  sun  and  summer-gale. 
In  thy  green  lap  was  Nature's  Darling  laid, 

with  the  writings  of  Dante  or  of  Petrarch.  The  Earl 
of  Surrey  and  Sir  Thomas  Wyatt  had  travelled  in  Italy, 
and  formed  their  tastes  there.  Spenser  imitated  the 
Italian  writers  ;  Milton  improved  on  them ;  but  this 
school  expired  soon  after  the  Restoration,  and  a  new 
one  arose  ou  the  French  model,  which  has  subsisted 
ever  since.  84.    Shakespeare. 


86  THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

What  time,  where  lucid  Avon  strayed, 

To  him  the  mighty  Mother  did  unveil 
Her  awful  face.     The  dauntless  Child 
Stretched  forth  his  little  arms,  and  smiled. 
This  pencil  take  (she  said)  whose  colours  clear 
Kichly  paint  the  vernal  year ; 
Thine  too  these  golden  keys,  immortal  Boy  I 
This  can  unlock  the  gates  of  Joy, 
Of  Horror  that,  and  thrilling  Fears, 
Or  ope  the  sacred  source  of  sympathetic  Tears. 

III.  2. 

J*^or  second  He,  that  rode  sublime  95 

Upon  the  seraph- wings  of  Ecstasy, 
The  secrets  of  th'  Abyss  to  spy, 

He  passed  the  flaming  bounds  of  Place  and 
Time; 
The  living  Throne,  the  sapphire-blaze, 
When  Angels  tremble,  while  they  gaze, 

95.     Milton. 

98.  "  Flammantia  moenia  mundi." 

Lucretius,  i.     74. 

99.  "  For  the  spirit  of  the  living  creature  was  in  the 
wheels  .  .  .  And  above  the  firmament,  that  was  over 
the  heads,  was  the  likeness  of  a  throne,  as  the  appear- 
ance of  the  glory  of  the  Lord."— Ezekiel,  1.  20,  26,  28. 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY,  g? 

He  saw  ;  but  blasted  with  excess  of  light, 

Closed  his  eyes  in  endless  night. 

Behold  where  Diyden's  less  presumptuous  car 

Wide  o'er  the  fields  of  Glorv  bear 

Two  Coursers  of  ethereal  race, 

With  necks  in   thunder  clothed,   and  long 
resounding  pace.  106 

III. 

Hark,  his  hands  the  lyre  explore ! 
Bright-eyed  Fancy  hovering  o'er 
Scatters  from  her  pictured  urn 
Thoughts,  that  breathe,  and  words,  that  burn. 

But  ah  !  'tis  heard  no  more 


106    Meant  to  express  the  stately  march  and  sounding 
energy  of  Dryden's  rhymes. 

"  Hast  thou  clothed  his  neck  with  thunder  ? 

Job  xxxix.  19. 

110.  "  Words,  that  weep,  and  tears,  that  speak." 

Cowley. 

111.  We  have  had  in  our  language  no  other  odes  of 
the  sublime  kind,  than  that  of  Dryden  on  St.  Cecilia's 
Day  ;  for  Cowley  (who  had  his  merit)  yet  wanted  judg- 
ment, style,  and  harmony,  for  such  a  task.  That  of 
Poke  is  not  worthy  of  so  great  a  man.  Mr.  Mason 
indeed  of  late  days  had  touched  the  true  chords,   and 


88  THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

Oh  !  Lyre  divine,  what  daring  Spirit 

Wakes  thee  now  ?  tho'  he  inherit 
Nor  the  pride,  nor  ample  pinion, 

That  the  Theban  Eagle  bear 
Sailing  with  supreme  dominion 

Thro'  the  azure  deep  of  air ; 
Yet  oft  before  his  infant  eyes  would  run 

Such  forms,  as  glitter  in  the  Muse's  ray 
With  orient  hue,  unborrowed  of  the  sun  ; 

Yet  shall  he  mount,  and  keep  his  distant  way 
Beyond  the  limits  of  a  vulgar  fate, 
Beneath  the  Good  how  far — but  far  above  the 
Great. 

with  a  masterly  hand,  in  some  of  his  Choruses, — ^above 
all  in  the  last  of  Caractacus  : 

Hark  1  heard  ye  not  you  footstep  dread  ?    etc. 

115.  Pindar  compares  himself  to  that  bird,  and  his 
enemies  to  ravens  that  croak  and  clamour  in  vain  be- 
low, while  it  pursues  its  flight,  regardless  of  their  noise. 


THE  BARD.  89 

VI. 

THE  BAKD. 

A    PINDARIC    ODE. 

The  following  Ode  is  founded  on  a  tradition  current 
in  Wales,  that  Edward  the  First,  when  he  completed 
the  conquest  of  that  country,  ordered  all  the  bards  that 
fell  into  his  hands  to  be  put  to  death. 

'  Rum  seize  thee,  ruthless  King  ! 
'  Confusion  on  thy  banners  wait, 
*  Though  fanned  by  Conquest's  crimson  wing 
They  mock  the  air  with  idle  state. 
Helm,  nor  hauberk's  twisted  mail, 
Nor  even  thy  virtues.  Tyrant,  shall  avail 
'  To  save  thy  secret  soul  from  nightly  fears> 
'  From    Cambria's   curse,    from    Cambria's 
tears ! ' 

Such  were  the  sounds,  that  o'er  the  crested 
pride  9 

4.  *'  Mocking  the  air  with  colours  idly  spread." 

Shakespeare's  King  John,  v.  I. 

5.  The  hauberk  was  a  texture  of  steel  ringlets,  or 
rings  interwoven,  forming  a  coat  of  mail,  that  sat  close 
to  the  body,  and  adapted  itself  to  every  motion. 

9.        "The  crested  adder's  pride." 

Dryden.  Indian  Queen. 


90 


THE  BARD. 


Of  the  first  Edward  scattered  wild  dismay, 
As  down  the  steep  of  Snowdon's  shaggy  side 
He  wound   with  toilsome   march  his  long 
array. 
Stout  Glo'ster  stood  aghast  in  speechless  trance ; 
'  To  arms  ! '  cried  Mortimer,  and  couched  his 
quivering  lance. 

I.  2. 

On  a  rock,  whose  haughty  brow, 
Frowns  o'er  old  Conway's  foaming  flood, 

Robed  in  the  sable  garb  of  woe, 
With  haggard  eyes  the  Poet  stood  ; 


11.  Snowdon  was  a  name  given  by  the  Saxons  to  that 
mountainous  tract  which  the  Welsh  themselves  call 
Craigian-eryri ;  it  included  all  the  highlands  of  Caernar- 
vonshire and  Merionethshire,  as  far  east  as  the  river 
Conway.  R.  Hygden,  speaking  of  the  castle  of  Conway 
built  by  King  Edward  the  First,  says,  "  Ad  ortum  amnis 
Conway  ad  clivum  montis  Erery  ;  "  and  Matthew  of 
"Westminster  (ad  ann.  1283),  "  Apud  Aberconway  ad 
pedes  montis  Snowdoniae  fecit  erigi  castrum  forte." 

13.  Gilbert  de  Clare,  surnamed  the  Red,  Earl  of 
Gloucester  and  Hertford,  son-in-law  to  King  Edward. 

14.  Edmond  de  Mortimer,  Lord  of  Wigmore.  They 
both  were  Lords-Marchers,  whose  lands  lay  on  the 
borders  of  Wales,  and  probably  accompanied  the  king 
in  this  expedition. 


A  PINDARIC  ODE.  91 

(Loose  his  beard,  and  hoary  hair 
Streamed,  like  a  meteor,    to  the   troubled 

air)  20 

And  with  a  Master's  hand,  and  Prophet's  fire, 
Struck  the  deep  sorrows  of  his  lyre. 

'  Hark,  how  each  giant-oak,  and  desert  cavej 
'  Sighs  to  the  torrent's  awful  voice  beneath ! 
'  O'er  thee,  oh  King !  their  hundred  arms  they 
wave, 
'Kevenge    on    thee    in    hoarser    murmurs 
breathe ; 
'  Vocal  no  more,  since  Cambria's  fatal  day, 
*  To  high-born  Hoel's  harp,  or  soft  Llewellyn's 
lay. 

1.3. 

*  Cold  is  Cadwallo's  tongue,    - 
*  That  hushed  the  stormy  main  ;  30 

19.  The  image  was  taken  from  a  well-known  picture 
of  Raphael,  representing  the  Supreme  Being  in  the 
vision  of  Ezekiel.  There  are  two  of  these  paintings 
(both  believed  original),  one  at  Florence,  the  other  at 
Paris. 

20.  "  Shone,  like  a  meteor,  streaming  to  the  wind. 

Milton'B  Paradise  Lost,  i.  637. 


92  THE  BARD. 

*  Brave  Urien  sleeps  upon  his  craggy  bed ; 

*  Mountains,  ye  mourn  in  vain 

*  Modred,  whose  magic  song 

*  Made  huge  Plinlimmon  bow  his  cloud-toppod 

head. 

*  On  dreary  Arvon's  shore  they  lie, 

*  Smeared  with  gore,  and  ghastly  pale ; 

*  Far,  far  aloof  th'  affrighted  ravens  sail ; 

'  The  famished  Eagle  screams,  and  passes  by. 

*  Dear  lost  companions  of  my  tuneful  art,     39 

'  Dear,  as  the  light  that  visits  these  sad  eyes, 

*  Dear,  as  the  ruddy  drops  that  warm  my 

heart, 

*  Ye  died  amidst  your  dying  country's  cries — 

35.  The  shores  of  Caernarvonshire  opposite  to  the  Isle 
of  Anglesey. 

38.  Cambden  and  others  observe,  that  eagles  used 
annually  to  build  their  aerie  among  the  rocks  of  Snow- 
don,  which  from  thence  (as  some  think)  were  named 
by  the  Welsh  Craigian  eryri,  or  the  crags  of  the  eagles. 
At  this  day  (I  am  told)  the  liighest  point  of  Snowdon 
is  called  the  eagle's  nest.  That  bird  is  certainly  no 
stranger  to  this  island,  as  the  Scots,  and  the  people  of 
Cumberland,  Westmoreland,  etc.,  can  testify  ;  it  even 
has  built  its  nest  in  the  Peak  of  Derbyshire.  (See  Wil- 
loughby's  Ornithol.,  published  by  Ray.) 

40.  "As  dear  to  me  as  are  the  ruddy  drops 

That  visit  my  sad  heart." — Julius  Ccesar,  ii.  1, 


A  PINDARIC  ODE.  93 

*  No  more  I  weep.     They  do  not  sleep. 

'  On  yonder  cliffs,  a  grisly  band, 

*  I  see  them  sit,  they  linger  yet, 

'  Avengers  of  their  native  land  ; 

*  With  me  in  dreadful  harmony  they  join, 
*And  wave  with  bloody  hands  the  tissue  of 

thy  line.' 

II.  1. 

"  "Weave  the  warp,  and  weave  the  woof, 
"  The  winding-sheet  of  Edward's  race.  60 

"  Give  ample  room,  and  verge  enough 
"  The  characters  of  hell  to  trace. 
"  Mark  the  year,  and  mark  the  night, 
"  When  Severn  shall  re-echo  with  affright 
"The  shrieks  of  death,  thro'  Berkley's  roofs 

that  ring, 
"  Shrieks  of  an  agonizing  King ! 

"  She-Wolf    of    France,    with    unrelenting 
fangs, 

48.  See  the  Norwegian  Ode  that  follows. 

54.  Edward  the  Second,  cruelly  butchered  in  Berk- 
ley-Castle. 

57.  Isabel  of  France,  Edward  the  Second's  adulterous 
Queen. 


94 


THE  BARD. 


"That  tear'st    the    bowels    of  thy  mangled 

Mate, 
"  From  thee  be  born,  who  o'er  thy  country 

hangs 
"  The  scourge  of  Heaven.     What  Terrors  round 

him  wait !  60 

"  Amazement  in  his  van,  with  Flight  combined, 
"  And  sorrow's  faded  form,  and  solitude  behind. 


II.  2. 

"  Mighty  Victor,  mighty  Lord ! 
"  Low  on  his  funeral  couch  he  lies ! 

"  Ko  pitying  heart,  no  eye,  afford 
"  A  tear  to  grace  his  obsequies. 

"  Is  the  sable  Warrior  fled  ? 
"  Thy  son  is  gone.     He  rests  among  the  Dead. 
"  The  Swarm,  that  in  thy  noon-tide  beam  were 

born? 
"  Gone  to  salute  the  rising  Morn.  70 

59.  Triumphs  of  Edward  the  Third  in  France. 

64.  Death  of  that  King,  abandoned  by  his  Children, 
and  even  robbed  in  his  last  moments  by  his  Courtiers 
and  his  Mistress. 

67.  Edward,  the  Black  Prince,  dead  some  time  before 
bis  Father. 


A  PINDARIC  ODE.  95 

"  Fair  laughs  the  Morn  and  soft  the  Zephyr 
blows, 
"  "While  proudly  riding  o'er  the  azure  realm 
"  In  gallant  trim  the  gilded  Vessel  goes ; 
"  Youth  on  the  prow,  and  Pleasure  at  the 
helm ; 
"  Regardless  of  the  sweeping  Whirlwind's  sway, 
"That,   hushed  in  grim   repose,   expects  his 
evening-prey. 

II.  3. 

"  Fill  high  the  sparkling  bowl, 
"  The  rich  repast  prepare, 

"  Reft  of  a  crown,   he  yet  may  share  the 
feast ; 
"  Close  by  the  regal  chair  80 

"  Fell  Thirst  and  Famine  scowl 

"  A  baleful  smile  upon  their  baffled  Guest. 
"  Heard  ye  the  din  of  battle  bray, 

71.  Magnificence  of  Richard  the  Second's  reign. 
See  Froissard  and  other  contemporary  writers. 

77.  Richard  the  Second  (as  we  are  told  by  Archbishop 
Scroop,  and  the  confederate  Lords  in  their  manifesto, 
by  Thomas  of  Walsingham,  and  all  the  older  wi-itors) 
was  starved  to  death.  The  story  of  his  assassination  by 
Sir  Piers  of  Exon,  is  of  much  later  date. 

83.  Ruinous  civil  wars  of  York  and  Lancaster. 


96 


THE  BARD. 


"  Lance  to  lance,  and  horse  to  horse  ? 
"  Long  Years  of  havoc    urge    their  destined 
course, 
*'  And  thro'  the  kindred  squadrons  mow  their 
way. 
"  Ye    Towers    of    Julius,  London's    lasting 
shame, 
"  "With  many  a  foul  and  midnight  murther  fed, 
"  Revere    his  Consort's  faith,  his  Father's  * 
frame, 
"  And  spare  the  meek  Usurper's  holy  head.  90 
"  Above,  below,  the  rose  of  snow, 

"  Twined  with  her  blushing  foe,  we  spread  ; 
*'  The  bristled  Boar  in  infant-gore 

87.  Henry  the  Sixth,  George  Duke  of  Clarence, 
Edward  the  Fifth,  Richard  Duke  of  York,  etc.,  believed 
to  be  murthered  secretly  in  the  Tower  of  London.  The 
oldest  part  of  that  structure  is  vulgarly  attributed  to 
Julius  Caesar. 

89.  Margaret  of  Anjou,  a  woman  of  heroic  spirit,  who 
struggled  hard  to  save  her  Husband  and  her  Crown. 

*  Henry  the  Fifth. 

90.  Henry  the  Sixth  very  near  being  canonized.  The 
line  of  Lancaster  had  no  right  of  inheritance  to  the 
Crown. 

9L  The  white  and  red  roses,  devices  of  York  and 
Lancaster. 

93.  The  silver  Boar  was  the  badge  of  Richard  the 
Third  ;  whence  he  was  iisually  known  in  his  own  time 
by  the  name  of  the  Boar. 


A  PINDARIC  ODE,  97 

"  Wallows  beneath  the  thorny  shade. 
"  Now,  Brothers,  bending  o'er  th'  accursed  loom 
"  Stamp  we  our  vengeance  deep,  and  ratify  his 
doom. 

III.  1. 
"  Edward,  lo !  to  sudden  fate 
"  (Weave  we  the  woof.     The  thread  is  spun.) 

"  Half  of  thy  heart  we  consecrate. 
"  (The  web  is  wove.      The  work  is  done.)"  100 

*  Stay,  oh  stay  !  nor  thus  forlorn 

*  Leave  me  unblessed,  unpitied,  here  to  mourn  ; 

*  In  yon  bright    track,  that   fires  the  western 

skies, 

*  They  melt,  they  vanish  from  my  eyes. 

'  But  oh !  what  solemn  scenes  on   Snowdon's 
height 
'  Descending  slow  their  glitt'ring  skirts  un- 
roll? 

*  Visions  of  glory,  spare  my  aching  sight, 

*  Ye  unborn  Ages,  crowd  not  on  ray  soul  ! 

99.  Eleanor  of  Castile  died  few  years  after  the  conquest 
of  Wales.  Tiie  heroic  proof  she  gave  of  her  affection 
for  her  Lord  is  well  known.  The  monuments  of  his 
regret  and  sorrow  for  the  loss  of  her,  are  still  to  be  seen 
at  Northampton,  Geddington,  Waltham,  and  other 
places. 


98  THE  BARD. 

*  No  more  our  long-lost  Arthur  we  bewail. 

*  All  hail,  ye  genuine  Kings,  Britannia's  Issue, 

hail  I 


III.  2. 

*  Girt  with  many  a  Baron  bold 

*  Sublime  their  starry  fronts  they  rear  ; 

'  And  gorgeous  Dames,  and  Statesmen  old 

*  In  bearded  majesty,  appear. 

*  In  the  midst  a  Form  divine  ! 

'  Her  eye  proclaims  her  of  the  Briton-Line  ; 

*  Her  lion-port,  her  awe  commanding  face, 

*  Attempered  sweet  to  virgin-grace. 

'  What  strings  symphonious  tremble  in  the  air, 

109.  It  was  the  common  belief  of  the  Welsh  nation, 
that  King  Arthur  was  still  alive  in  Fairy-Land,  and 
should  return  again  to  reign  over  Britain 

110.  Accession  of  the  Line  of  Tudor. — Chray,  Ed.  1757. 
Both  Merlin  and  Taliessin  had  prophesied,  that  the 
Welsh  should  regain  their  sovereignty  over  this  island  ; 
which  seemed  to  be  accomplished  in  the  House  of 
Tudor. 

117.  Speed,  relating  an  audience  given  by  Queen 
Elizabeth  to  Paul  Dzialinski,  ambassador  of  Poland, 
says  :  "  And  thus  she,  lion-like  rising,  daunted  the 
malapert  Orator  no  less  with  her  stately  port  and 
majestical  deporture,  than  with  the  tartness  of  her 
princely  cheeks." 


A  PINDARIC  ODE.  99 

*  What  strains  of  vocal  transport  round  her 

play !  120 

'  Hear  from  the  grave,  great  Taliessin,  hear ; 
'  They  breathe  a  soul  to  animate  thy  clay. 

*  Bright  Kapture  calls,  and  soaring,  as  she  sings, 

*  Waves  in  the  eye  of  Heaven  her  many-coloured 

wings. 

III.   3. 

*  The  verse  adorn  again 

*  Fierce  War,  and  faithful  Love, 

*  And  Truth  severe,  by  fairy  Fiction  drest. 

*  In  buskined  measures  move 

Pale  Grief,  and  pleasing  Pain,  129 

*  With  Horror,  Tyrant  of  the  throbbing  breast. 

*  A  Yoice  as  of  the  Cherub-Choir, 
'  Gales  from  blooming  Eden  bear  ; 

'  And  distant  warblings  lessen  on  my  ear, 
'  That  lost  in  long  futurity  expire. 

121.  Taliessin,  Chief  of  the  Bards,  flourished  in  the 
Vlth  century.  His  works  are  still  preserved,  and 
his  memory  held  in  high  veneration  among  his  coun- 
trymen. 

126.  "  Fierce  wars  and  faithful  loves  shall  moralize 
my  song."— Spenser,   Proline  to  the  Fairy  Queen. 

128.   Shakespeare.  131.   Milton. 

183.   The  succession  of  Poets  after  Milton's  time. 


100  THE  BARD. 

*  Fond  impious  Man,  think'st  thou,  yon  sanguine 

cloud, 

*  Raised  by  thy  breath,  has  quenched  the  Orb 

of  day  ? 

*  To-raorrow  he  repairs  the  golden  flood, 

*  And  warms  the  nations  with,  redoubled  ray. 

*  Enough  for  me.     With  joy  I  see 

'  The  different  doom  our  Fates  assign.      140 

*  Be  thine  Despair,  and  sceptred  Care, 

'  To  triumph,  and  to  die,  are  mine.* 

He  spoke,  and  headlong  from  the  mountain's 

height 
Deep  in  the  roaring  tide  he  plunged  to  endless 

night 


THE  FATAL  SISTERS.  101 

YII. 
THE  FATAL  SISTEKS. 

AN  ODE, 

(from  the  nokse  tongue,) 

In  the  Orcades  of  Thormodus  Torfseus  ;  Hafniae, 
1697,  folio  ;  and  also  in  Bartholinus. 

Advertisement. — The  Author  once  had  thoughts  (in 
concert  with  a  Friend)  of  giving  the  History  of  English 
Poetry.  In  the  Introduction  to  it  he  meant  to  havd 
produced  some  specimens  of  the  Style  that  reigned  in 
ancient  times  among  the  neighbouring  nations,  or  those 
who  had  subdued  the  greater  part  of  this  Island,  and 
were  our  Progenitors  ;  the  following  three  Imitations 
made  a  part  of  them.  He  has  long  since  dropped  his 
design,  especially  after  he  heard,  that  it  was  already 
in  the  hands  of  a  Person  well  qualified  to  do  it  justice, 
both  by  his  taste,  and  his  researches  into  antiquity. — 
Gray,  1768. 

Preface. — In  the  Eleventh  Century,  Sigurd,  Earl 
of  the  Orkney-Islands,  went  with  a  fleet  of  ships  and  a 
considerable  body  of  troops  into  Ireland,  to  the  assist- 
ance of  Sietryg  xoith  the  silken  heard,  who  was  then 
making  war  on  his  father-in-law  Brian,  king  of  Dublin  ; 
the  Earl  and  all  his  forces  were  cut  to  pieces,  and  Sietryg 
was  in  danger  of  a  total  defeat  ;  but  the  enemy  had  a 
greater  loss  by  the  death  of  Brian  their  king,  wlio  fell 
in  the  action.  On  Christmas  Day  (the  day  of  the  battle) , 
a  Native  of  Caithness  in  Scotland  saw  at  a  distance  a 
number  of  persons  on  horseback  riding  full  speed  to- 
wards a  hill,  and  seeming  to  enter  into  it.     Curiosity 


22— G  &  G— S 


102  THE  FATAL  SISTERS. 

led  him  to  follow  them,  till  looking  through  an  opening 
in  the  rocks,  he  saw  twelve  gigantic  figures  resem- 
bling women  ;  they  were  all  employed  about  a  loom  ; 
and  as  they  wove,  they  sung  the  following  dreadful 
Song  ;  which,  when  they  had  finished,  they  tore  the 
web  into  twelve  pieces,  and  (each  taking  her  portion) 
galloped  six  to  the  North,  and  as  many  to  the  South. — 
Gray,  1768. 

Now  the  storm  begins  to  lower 
(Haste,  the  loom  of  Hell  prepare,) 

Iron-sleet  of  arrowy  shower 
Hurtles  in  the  darkened  air. 

Glitt'ring  lances  are  the  loom, 
Where  the  dusky  warp  we  strain, 

"Weaving  many  a  soldier's  doom, 

Orkney'' s  woe,  and  Bandver''s  bane.  8 

1.  The  ValJcyriur  were  female  Divinities,  servants  of 
Odin  (or  Woden),  in  the  Gothic  mythology.  Their 
name  signifies  Chusers  of  the  slain.  They  were  mounted 
on  swift  horses,  with  drawn  swords  in  their  hands  ;  and 
in  the  throng  of  battle  selected  such  as  were  destined 
to  slaughter,  and  conducted  them  to  Valhalla,  the  hall 
of  Odin,  or  paradise  of  the  Brave  ;  where  they  attended 
the  banquet,  and  served  the  departed  Heroes  with  horns 
of  mead  and  ale. 

3.  "  How  quick  they  wheeled,  and,  flying,  behind 

them  shot 
Sharp  sleet  of  arrowy  showers," 

Milton's  Par.  Regained,  iii.  323,  324. 

4.  "  The  noise  of  battle  hurtled  in  the  air." 

Shakespeare,  Julius  Ccesar,  ii.  S. 


AN  ODE.  103 

See  the  grisly  texture  grow, 

('Tis  of  human  entrails  made) 
And  the  weights,  that  play  below, 

Each  a  gasping  warrior's  head. 

Shafts  for  shuttles,  dipt  in  gore, 
Shoot  the  trembling  cords  along. 

Sword,  that  once  a  monarch  bore, 

Keep  the  tissue  close  and  strong.  16 

Mista  black,  terrific  maid, 

Sangrida,  and  Hilda,  see. 
Join  the  wayward  work  to  aid ; 

'Tis  the  woof  of  victory. 

Ere  the  ruddy  sun  be  set. 

Pikes  must  shiver,  javelins  sing, 

Blade  with  clattering  buckler  meet, 
Hauberk  crash,  and  helmet  ring. 

("Weave  the  crimson  web  of  war) 

Let  us  go,  and  let  us  fly, 
"Where  our  friends  the  conflict  share, 

Where  they  triumph,  where  they  die. 

As  the  paths  of  fate  we  tread. 

Wading  though  th'  ensanguined  field ; 


104:  THE  FATAL  SISTERS. 

Gondula  and  Geira,  spread 
O'er  the  youthful  King  your  shield.        32 

We  the  reins  to  slaughter  give, 

Ours  to  kill  and  ours  to  spare ; 
Spite  of  danger  he  shall  live. 

(Weave  the  crimson  web  of  war.) 

They,  whom  once  the  desert  beach 

Pent  within  its  bleak  domain. 
Soon  their  ample  sway  shall  stretcti 

O'er  the  plenty  of  the  plain.  40 

Low  the  dauntless  Earl  is  laid, 

Gored  with  many  a  gaping  wound  ; 

Fate  demands  a  nobler  head  ; 

Soon  a  King  shall  bite  the  ground. 

Long  his  loss  shall  Eirin  weep, 

Ne'er  again  his  likeness  see  ; 
Long  her  strains  in  sorrow  steep, 

Strains  of  immortality  !  48 

Horror  covers  all  the  heath, 
Clouds  of  carnage  blot  the  sun. 

Sisters,  weave  the  web  of  death ; 
Sisters,  cease,  the  work  is  done. 


AN  ODE.  105 

Hail  the  task,  and  hail  the  hands ! 

Songs  of  joy  and  triumph  sing 
Joy  to  the  victorious  bands  ; 

Triumph  to  the  younger  King  56 

Mortal,  thou  that  hear'st  the  tale, 

Learn  the  tenor  of  our  song. 
Scotland,  thro'  each  winding  vale 

Far  and  wide  the  notes  prolong 

Sisters,  hence  with  spurs  of  speed  ; 

Each  her  thundering  faulchion  wield 
Each  bestride  her  sable  steed. 

Hurry,  hurry  to  the  field.  64 


106  THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN. 


YIII. 
THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN. 

AN  ODE 
FROM  THE  NOKSE  TONGUE, 

In  Bartholinus,  de  causis  oontemnendae  mortis 
Hafniae,  1689. 

Uprose  the  King  of  Men  with  speed, 

And  saddled  strait  his  coal-black  steed ; 

Down  the  yawning  steep  he  rode, 

That  leads  to  Hela's  drear  abode. 

Hira  the  Dog  of  Darkness  spied, 

His  shaggy  throat  he  opened  wide. 

While  from  his  jaws,  with  carnage  filled, 

Foam  and  human  gore  distilled ; 

Hoarse  he  bays  with  hideous  din. 

Eyes  that  glow,  and  fangs  that  grin ; 

And  long  pursues,  with  fruitless  yell,  10 

The  father  of  the  powerful  spell. 

4.  Niflheimr,  the  hell  of  the  Gothic  nations,  consisted 
of  nine  worlds,  to  which  were  devoted  all  such  as  died 
of  sickness,  old-age,  or  by  any  other  means  than  in  bat- 
tle.     Over  it  presided  Hela,  the  Goddess  of  Death. 


AN  ODE.  107 

Onward  still  his  way  he  takes, 

( The  groaning  earth  beneath  him  shakes,) 

Till  full  before  his  fearless  eyes 

The  portals  nine  of  hell  arise. 

Right  against  the  eastern  gate, 
By  the  moss-grown  pile  he  sate ; 
Where  long  of  yore  to  sleep  was  laid 
The  dust  of  the  prophetic  Maid.  20 

Facing  to  the  northern  clime. 
Thrice  he  traced  the  runic  rhyme; 
Thrice  pronounced,  in  accents  dread. 
The  thrilling  verse  that  wakes  the  dead  ; 
Till  from  out  the  hollow  ground 
Slowly  breathed  a  sullen  sound. 

Prophetess.  What     call      unknown,     what 
charms  presume 
To  break  the  quiet  of  the  tomb  ? 
Who  thus  afflicts  my  troubled  sprite, 
And  drags  me  from  the  realms  of  night  ?       30 
Long  on  these  mould'ring  bones  have  beat 
The  winter's  snow,  the  summer's  heat. 
The  drenching  dews,  and  driving  rain! 
Let  me,  let  me  sleep  again. 


108  THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN. 

"Who  is  he,  with  voice  un  blest, 
That  calls  me  from  the  bed  of  rest  ? 

Odin.  A  Traveller,  to  thee  unknown, 
Is  he  that  calls,  a  Warrior's  son. 
Thou  the  deeds  of  light  shalt  know ; 
Tell  me  what  is  done  below,  40 

For  whom  yon  glitt'ring  board  is  spread, 
Drest  for  whom  yon  golden  bed, 

Pr.  Mantling  in  the  goblet  see 
The  pure  beverage  of  the  bee, 
O'er  it  hangs  the  shield  of  gold  ; 
'Tis  the  drink  of  Balder  bold ; 
Balder' s  head  to  death  is  given. 
Pain  can  reach  the  sons  of  Heaven  I 
Unwilling  I  my  lips  unclose ; 
Leave  me,  leave  me  to  repose.  60 

O.  Once  again  my  call  obey. 
Prophetess,  arise,  and  say. 
What  dangers  OdirCs  child  await, 
Who  the  Author  of  his  fate. 

Pr.  In  Hoder''s  hand  the  Hero's  doom ; 
His  brother  sends  him  to  the  tomb. 


AN  ODE.  109 

Now  my  weary  lips  I  close ; 
Leave  me,  leave  me  to  repose, 

0.  Prophetess,  my  spell  obey, 
Once  again  arise,  and  saj^-,  60 

Who  th'  Avenger  of  his  guilt. 
By  whom  shall  Iloder^s  blood  be  spilt. 

Pr.  In  the  caverns  of  the  west, 
By  Odin^s  fierce  embrace  comprest, 
A  wond'rous  Boy  shall  Rinda  bear, 
Who  ne' er  shall  comb  his  raven-hair, 
Nor  wash  his  visage  in  the  stream. 
Nor  see  the  sun's  departing  beam, 
Till  he  on  Iloderh  corse  shall  smile 
Flaming  on  the  fun'ral  pile. 
Now  my  weary  lips  I  close ; 
Leave  me,  leave  me  to  repose. 

O.  Yet  a  while  my  call  obey. 
Prophetess,  awake,  and  say. 
What  Virgins  these,  in  speechless  woe, 
That  bend  to  earth  their  solemn  brow, 
That  their  flaxen  tresses  tear. 
And  snowy  veils,  that  float  in  air. 


110  THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN. 

Tell  me  whence  their  sorrows  rose ; 

Then  I  leave  thee  to  repose.  80 

Pr.  Ha !  no  Traveller  art  thou, 
King  of  Men,  I  know  thee  now 
Mightiest  of  a  mighty  line 

0.  No  boding  Maid  of  skill  divine 
Art  thou,  nor  Prophetess  of  good ; 
But  Mother  of  the  giant-brood  ! 

Pr.  Hie  thee  hence,  and  boast  at  home. 
That  never  shall  enquirer  come 
To  break  my  iron-sleep  again ; 
Till  Lok  has  burst  his  tenfold  chain.  90 

Never,  till  substantial  Night 
Has  reassumed  her  ancient  right ; 
Till  wrapped  in  flames,  in  ruin  hurled, 
Sinks  the  fabric  of  the  world. 

90.  Lidk  is  the  evil  Being,  who  continues  in  chains  till 
the  Twilight  of  the  Oods  approaches,  when  he  shall 
break  his  bonds  ;  the  human  race,  the  stars,  and  sun, 
shall  disappear  ;  the  earth  sink  in  the  seas,  and  fire 
consume  the  skies  ;  even  Odin  himself  and  his  kindred- 
deities  shall  perish.  For  a  further  explanation  of  this 
mythology,  see  Mallet's  Introduction  to  the  History  of 
Denmark,  1755,  quarto, 


THE  TRIUMPHS  OF  OWEN.  HI 

IX. 
THE  TRIUMPHS  OF  OWEN. 

A  FRAGMENT. 

From  Mr.   Evans'    Specimens  of    the  Welsh  Poetry; 
London,  1764. 

Advertisement.—  Owen  succeeded  his  Father  Grif- 
fin in  the  Principality  of  North  Wales,  a.  d.  1120. 
This  battle  was  fought  near  forty  years  afterwards. 

Owen's  praise  demands  my  song, 
Owen  swift,  and  Owen  strong ; 
Fairest  flower  of  Eoderic's  stem, 
Gwyneth's  shield,  and  Britain's  gem. 
He  nor  lieaps  his  brooded  stores, 
Nor  on  all  profusely  pours  ; 
Lord  of  every  regal  art. 
Liberal  hand,  and  open  heart. 

Big  with  hosts  of  mighty  name. 
Squadrons  three  against  him  came ;        10 
This  the  force  of  Eirin  hiding, 
Side  by  side  as  proudly  riding. 
On  her  shadow  long  and  gay 
Lochlin  ploughs  the  watry  way  ; 
4.  North  Wales.  14.  Denmark. 


112  THE  TRIUMPHS  OF  OWEN. 

There  the  Norman  sails  afar 
Catch  the  winds,  and  join  the  war ; 
Black  and  huge  along  they  sweep, 
Burthens  of  the  angry  deep. 

Dauntless  on  his  native  sands 

The  Dragon-son  of  Mona  stands ;  20 

In  glitt'ring  arms  and  glory  drest, 

High  he  rears  his  ruby  crest. 

There  the  thund'ring  strokes  begin, 

There  the  press,  and  there  the  din  j 

Talymalfra's  rocky  shore 

Echoing  to  the  battle's  roar. 

Where  his  glowing  eye-balls  turn, 

Thousand  banners  round  him  burn. 

Where  he  points  his  purple  spear, 

Hasty,  hasty  Rout  is  there,  30 

Marking  with  indignant  eye 

Fear  to  stop  and  shame  to  fly. 

There  Confusion,  Terror's  child, 

Conflict  fierce,  and  Ruin  wild. 

Agony,  that  pants  for  breath. 

Despair  and  honourable  Death. 
*  *  *  * 

20.    The  red  Dragon  is  the  device  of  Cadwallader, 
which  all  his  descendants  bore  on  their  banners. 


A  COUNTRY  CHURCHYARD.  J 13 


X 

ELEGY. 

WRITTEN   IN  A 

COUNTRY  CHURCHYARD. 

The  curfew  tolls  the  knell  of  parting  day, 
The  lowing  herd  wind  slowly  o'er  the  lea, 

The  ploughman  homeward  plods  his  weary  way, 
And  leaves  the  world  to  darkness  and  to  me. 

Now  fades  the  glimmering  landscape  on  the 

sight, 

And  all  the  air  a  solemn  stillness  holds, 

Save  where  the  beetle  wheels  his  droning  flight. 

And     drowsy     tinklingS     lull   the  distant 

folds ;  8 

Save  that  from  yonder  ivy-mantled  tower 
The  moping  owl  does  to  the  moon  complain 

Of  such  as,  wand'ring  near  her  secret  bower, 
Molest  her  ancient  solitary  reign. 

1.  "...  squilla  di  lontano 

Che  paia  '1  giorno  piauger,  che  si  muore." 

Dante,  Piirgat,  I.  8. 


114:  ELEGY  WRITTEN  IN 

Beneath  those  rugged   elms,    that  yew-tree's 
shade, 
"Where  heaves  the  turf  in  many  a  mould'ring 
heap. 
Each  in  his  narrow  cell  for  ever  laid, 

The  rude  Forefathers  of  the  hamlet  sleep.  16 

The  breezy  call  of  incense-breathing  Morn, 
The  swallow  twitt'ring  from  the  straw-built 
shed, 
The  cock's  shrill  clarion,  or  the  echoing  horn, 
No  more  shall  rouse  them  from  their  lowly 
bed. 

For  them  no  more    the  blazing  hearth  shall 
burn, 

Or  busy  housewife  ply  her  evening  care ; 
Ko  children  run  to  lisp  their  sire's  return. 

Or  climb  his  knees  the  envied  kiss  to  share.  24 

Oft  did  the  harvest  to  their  sickle  yield. 
Their  furrow  oft    the  stubborn  glebe  has 
broke ; 
How  jocund  did  they  drive  their  team  afield ! 
How  bowed  the  woods  beneath  their  sturdy 
stroke ! 


A  COUNTRY  CHURCHYARD.  115 

Let  not  Ambition  mock  their  useful  toil-, 
There  homely  joys,  and  destiny  obscure  ; 

Nor  Grandeur  hear,  with  a  disdainful  smile, 
The  short  and  simple  annals  of  the  poor.  32 

The  boast  of  heraldry,  the  pomp  of  power, 
And    all  that  beauty,  all  that  wealth  e'er 
gave, 

Awaits  alike  th'  inevitable  hour. 
The  paths  of  glory  lead  but  to  the  grave. 

Nor  you,  ye  Proud,  impute  to  these  the  fault. 

If  Mem'ry  o'er  their  tomb  no  trophies  raise, 

Where  thro'  the  long-drawn  aisle  and  fretted 

vault 

The    pealing    anthem    swells    the  note    of 

praise.  40 

Can  storied  urn  or  animated  bust 

Back  to  its  mansion  call  the  fleeting  breath  ? 
Can  Honour's  voice  provoke  the  silent  dust, 

Or  Flatt'ry  soothe  the  dull  cold  ear  of 
Death  ? 

Perhaps  in  this  neglected  spot  is  laid 

Some  heart  once  pregnant  with  celestial  fire; 


116  ELEGY  WRITTEN  IN 

Hands,  that  the  rod  of  empire  might  have 
swayed, 
Or  waked  to  ecstasy  the  living  lyre.  48 

But  Knowledge  to  their  eyes  her  ample  page 
Rich  with  the  spoils  of  time  did  ne'er  unroll ; 

Chill  Penury  repressed  their  noble  rage, 
And  froze  the  genial  current  of  the  soul. 

Full  many  a  gem,  of  purest  ray  serene. 
The  dark  unfathomed  caves  of  ocean  bear  ; 

Full  many  a  flower  is  born  to  blush  unseen. 
And  waste  its  sweetness  on  the  desert  air.  66 

Some  village-Hampden,  that  with  dauntless 
breast 
The  little  tyrant  of  his  fields  withstood  ; 
Some  mute  inglorious  Milton  here  may  rest. 
Some   Cromwell  guiltless  of  his  country's 
blood 

Th'  applause  of  list'ning  senates  to  command, 
The  threats  of  pain  and  ruin  to  despise. 

To  scatter  plenty  o'er  a  smiling  land. 
And  read  their  history  in  a  nation's  eyes,  64 


A  COUNTRY  CHURCHYARD.  117 

Their  lot  forbad  ;  nor  circumscribed  alone 
Their    growing    virtues,  but    their    crimes 
confined ; 

Forbad  to  wade  through  slaughter  to  a  throne, 
And  shut  the  gates  of  mercy  on  mankind, 

The  struggling  pangs  of  conscious  truth  to  hide, 
To  quench  the  blushes  of  ingenuous  shame, 

Or  heap  the  shrine  of  Luxury  and  Pride 
With  incense  kindled  at  the  Muse's  flame.  72 

Far  from  the  madding  crowd's  ignoble  strife, 
Their  sober  wishes  never  learned  to  stray  ; 

Along  the  cool  sequestered  vale  of  life 
They  kept  the  noiseless  tenor  of  their  way. 

Yet  ev'n  these  bones  from  insult  to  protect 
Some  frail  memorial  still  erected  nigh, 

With  uncouth  rhimes  and  shapeless  sculpture 
decked. 
Implores   the  passing  tribute  of  a  sigh.  80 

Their  name,  their  years,  spelt  by  th'  unlettered 
Muse, 

The  place  of  fame  and  elegy  supply  ; 
And  many  a  holy  text  around  she  strews, 

That  teach  the  rustic  moralist  to  die. 


118  ELEGY  WRITTEN  IN 

For  who,  to  dumb  Forgetfulness  a  prey, 
This  pleasing  anxious  being  e'er  resigned, 

Left  the  warm  precincts  of  the  cheerful  day, 
Nor  oast  one  longing    ling'ring    look    be- 
hind ?  88 

On  some  fond  breast  the  parting  soul  relies. 
Some  pious  drops  the  closing  eye  requires ; 

Ev'n  from  the  tomb  the  voice  of  Nature  cries, 
Ev'n  in  our  ashes  live  their  wonted  fires. 

For  thee,  who  mindful  of  th'  unhonoured  Dead 
Dost  in  these  lines  their  artless  tale  relate 

If  chance,  by  lonely  contemplation  led, 

Some  kindred  spirit  shall  inquire  thy  fate,  96 

Haply  some  hoary -headed  swain  may  say, 

*  Oft  have  we  seen  him  at  the  peep  of  dawn 

*  Brushing  with  hasty  steps  the  dews  away 

'  To  meet  the  sun  upon  the  upland  lawn. 

*  There  at  the  foot  of  yonder  nodding  beech, 

*  That  wreathes  its  old   fantastic  roots  so 

high, 

93  "Ch'i  veggio  nel  pensier,  dolce  mio  fuoco, 
Fredda  una  lingua,  e  due  begli  occhi  chiusi 
Rimaner  doppo  noi  pien  di  faville." 

Petrarch,  Son.  169. 


A  COUNTRY  CHURCHYARD.  II9 

<^His    listless   length   at  noontide  would    he 
stretch, 

*And   pore   upon  the  brook  that  babbles 

by.  104 

*  Hard  by  yon  wood,  now  smiling  as  in  scorn, 

*  Mutt'ring  his   wayward  fancies  he  would 

rove, 
Now  drooping,  woeful  wan,  like  one  forlorn, 
'  Or  crazed  with  care,  or  crossed  in  hopeless 
love. 

*One  morn  I  missed  him  on  the  customed 
hill, 

*  Along  the  heath  and  near  his  fav'rite  tree ; 

*  Another  came  ;  nor  yet  beside  the  rill, 

'Nor  up  the  lawn,  nor  at  the  wood  was  he  ;  112 

<  The  next  with  dirges  due  in  sad  array 

*  Slow  thro'  the  church-way  path  we  saw  him 

borne. 

<  Approach  and  read  (for  thou  can'st  read)  the 

lay, 

*  Graved  on  the  stone  beneath  yon  aged 

thorn.' 


220  ^  LONG  STORY. 


THE  EPITAPH. 

Here  rests  his  head  upon  the  lap  of  Earth 
A  Youth  to  Fortune  and  to  Fame  unknown. 

Fair  Science  frowned  not  on  his  humhle  hirth^ 
And  Melancholy  marked  him  for  her  own.  120 

Large  was  his  hounty^  and  his  soul  sincere^ 
Heav'n  did  a  recommence  as  largely  send  / 

He  gave  to  Misery  all  he  had^  a  tear, 

He  gained  from  Heav'n  i^twas  all  he  wished) 
a  friend. 

No  farther  seek  his  merits  to  disclose. 

Or  draw  his  frailties  from  their  dread  abode^ 

{There  they  alike  in  trembling  hope  repose,) 
The  hosom  of  his  Father  and  his  God.       128 


XI. 
A  LONG  STORY. 

In  Britain's  Isle,  no  matter  where, 
An  ancient  pile  of  building  stands; 

The  Huntingdons  and  Hattons  there 
Employed  the  power  of  Fairy  hands 

127  ....  paventosa  speme. — Petrarch,  Son,  114. 


A  LONG  STORY.  121 

To  raise  the  ceiling's  fretted  height, 
Each  panel  in  achievements  clothing, 

Rich  windows  that  exclude  the  light, 
And  passages,  that  lead  to  nothing. 

Full  oft  within  the  spacious  walls, 
When  he  had  fifty  winters  o'er  him. 

My  grave  Lord-keeper  led  the  brawls  ; 
The  seal,  and  maces,  danced  before  him. 

His  bushy  beard,  and  shoe-strings  green, 
His  high-crowned  hat,  and  satin-doublet. 

Moved  the  stout  heart  of  England's  Queen,  15 
Tho'  Pope  and  Spaniard  could  not  trouble  it. 

What,  in  the  very  first  beginning ! 

Shame  of  the  versifying  tribe  ! 
Your  Hist'ry  whither  are  you  spinning? 

Can  you  do  nothing  but  describe  ? 

A  house  there  is,  (and  that's  enough 
From  whence  one  fatal  morning  issues 

A  brace  of  warriors,  not  in  buff, 

But  rustling  in  their  silks  and  tissues.        24 

1 1 .  Hattou ,  preferred  by  Queen  Elizabeth  for  his  grace- 
ful person  and  fine  dancing. 


122  A  LONG  STORY. 

The  first  came  cap-a-pie  from  France, 
Her  conqu'ring  destiny  fulfilling, 

Whom  meaner  beauties  eye  askance, 
And  vainly  ape  her  art  of  killing. 

The  other  Amazon  kind  Heaven 

Had  armed  with  spirit,  wit,  and  satire ; 

But  CoBHAM  had  the  polish  given 

And  tipped  her  arrows  with  good-nature.  32 

To  celebrate  her  eyes,  her  air 

Coarse  panegyrics  would  but  tease  her. 

Melissa  is  her  nom  de  guerre. 
Alas,  who  would  not  wish  to  please  her ! 

With  bonnet  blue  and  capucine, 

And  aprons  long  they  hid  their  armour, 

And  veiled  their  weapons  bright  and  keen 
In  pity  to  the  country  farmer.  40 

Fame,  in  the  shape  of  Mr.  Purt, 
(By  this  time  all  the  parish  know  it) 

Had  told  that  thereabouts  there  lurked 
A  wicked  imp  they  call  a  Poet, 

Who  prowled  the  country  far  and  near, 
Bewitched  the  children  of  the  peasants, 


A  LONG  STORY.  123 

Dried  up  the  cows,  and  lamed  the  deer,         47 
And  sucked  the  eggs,  and  killed  the  pheas- 
ants. 

My  Lady  heard  their  joint  petition, 
Swore  by  her  coronet  and  ermine, 

She'd  issue  out  her  high  commission 
To  rid  the  manor  of  such  vermin. 

The  Heroines  undertook  the  task, 

Thro'  lanes  unknown,  o'er  stiles  they  ventured, 
Rapped  at  the  door,  nor  stayed  to  ask, 

But  bounce  into  the  parlour  entered.  56 

The  trembling  family  they  daunt, 

They  flirt,  they  sing,  they  laugh,  they  tattle. 
Rummage  his  Mother,  pinch  his  Aunt, 

And  up  stairs  in  a  whirlwind  rattle. 

Each  hole  and  cupboard  they  explore. 
Each  creek  and  cranny  of  his  chamber, 

Run  hurry-skurry  round  the  floor. 
And  o'er  the  bed  and  tester  clamber ;        64 

Into  the  drawers  and  china  pry. 

Papers  and  books,  a  huge  imbroglio ! 

Under  a  tea-cup  he  might  lie. 

Or  creased,  like  dogs-ears,  in  a  folio. 


124  A  LONG  STORY. 

On  the  first  marching  of  the  troops, 
The  Muses,  hopeless  of  his  pardon, 

Conveyed  him  underneath  their  hoops 

To  a  small  closet  in  the  garden.  72 

So  Rumor  says.     ("Who  "will,  believe,) 

But  that  they  left  the  door  a-jar, 
Where,  safe  and  laughing  in  his  sleeve, 

He  heard  the  distant  din  of  war. 

Short  was  his  joy.     He  little  knew 
The  power  of  Magic  was  no  fable ; 

Out  of  the  window,  whisk,  they  flew, 
But  left  a  spell  upon  the  table.  80 

The  words  too  eager  to  unriddle, 
The  Poet  felt  a  strange  disorder ; 

Transparent  birdlime  formed  the  middle, 
And  chains  invisible  the  border. 

So  cunning  was  the  apparatus, 

The  powerful  pot-hooks  did  so  move  him, 
That,  will  he,  nill  he,  to  the  great-house 
He  went,  as  if  the  Devil  drove  him.  88 

Yet  on  his  way  (no  sign  of  grace, 
For  folks  in  fear  are  apt  to  pray) 


A  LONG  STORY.  125 

To  Phoebus  he  preferred  his  case, 
And  begged  his  aid  that  dreadful  day. 

The  godhead  would  have  backed  his  quarrel, 
But,  with  a  blush  on  recollection, 

Owned  that  his  quiver  and  his  laurel 

'Gainst  four  such  eyes  were  no  protection.  96 

The  Court  was  sate,  the  Culprit  there. 

Forth  from  their  gloomy  mansions  creeping 

The  lady  Janes  and  Joans  repair. 
And  from  the  gallery  stand  peeping. 

Such  as  in  silence  of  the  night 

Come  (sweep)  along  some  winding  entry, 
{Styack  has  often  seen  the  sight) 

Or  at  the  chapel-door  stand  sentry ;  104 

In  peaked  hoods  and  mantles  tarnished, 
Sour  visages,  enough  to  scare  ye. 

High  Dames  of  honour  once,  that  garnished 
The  drawing-room  of  fierce  Queen  Mary  I 

The  Peeress  comes.    The  audience  stare, 
And  doff  their  hats  with  due  submission ; 

103.    The  House-keeper. 


22— Q  &  G— T 


126  A  LONG  STORY. 

She  curtsies,  as  she  takes  her  chair, 
To  all  the  people  of  condition.  112 

The  Bard,  with  many  an  artful  fib, 

Had  in  imagination  fenced  him, 
Disproved  the  arguments  of  Squib, 

And  all  that  Groorn  could  urge  against  him. 

But  soon  his  rhetoric  forsook  him, 
When  he  the  solemn  hall  had  seen ; 

A  sudden  fit  of  ague  phook  him, 
He  stood  as  mute  as  poor  Macleane,         120 

Yet  something  he  was  heard  to  mutter, 
"  How  in  the  park  beneath  an  old  tree, 

("Without  design  to  hurt  the  butter. 
Or  any  malice  to  the  poultry,) 

"  He  once  or  twice  had  penned  a  sonnet ; 

Yet  hoped,  that  he  might  save  his  bacon  ; 
Numbers  would  give  their  oaths  upon  it. 

He  ne'er  was  for  a  conjuror  taken."  128 

The  ghostly  Prudes  with  hagged  face 
Already  had  condemned  the  sinner. 

115.  Groom  of  the  Chambers. 

116.  The  Steward. 

130.  A  famous  highwayman  hanged  the  week  beforej 


A  LONG  STORY.  127 

My  Lady  rose,  and  with  a  grace 

She  smiled,  and  bid  him  come  to  dinner. 

"  Jesu-Maria !     Madame  Bridget, 
"Why,  what  can  the  Viscountess  mean  ? " 

(Cried  the  square  hoods  in  woful  fidget) 

"  The  times  are  altered  quite  and  clean  !  136 

"  Decorum's  turned  to  mere  civility  ; 

Her  air  and  all  her  manners  show  it. 
Commend  me  to  her  affability  ! 

Speak  to  a  Commoner  and  Poet !  " 

[Here  500  Stanzas  are  lost.] 

And  so  God  save  our  noble  King, 

And  guard  us  from  long-winded  lubbers, 

That  to  eternity  would  sing, 
And  keep  my  Lady  from  her  rubbers. 


128  ODE  FOR  MUSIC 

XII. 

ODE  FOR  MUSIC 

performed  at  the  installation  of  the  chan- 
cellor of  the  university  of  cambridge,  1769. 

Air. 

"  Hence,  avaunt,  ('tis  holy  ground) 

Comus,  and  his  midnight  crew. 
And  Ignorance  with  looks  profound, 

And  dreaming  Sloth  of  pallid  hue, 
Mad  Sedition's  cry  profane, 
Servitude  that  hugs  her  chain, 
Nor  in  these  consecrated  bowers 
Let  painted  Flatt'ry  hide  her  serpent  train  in 
flowers. 

Chorus. 
"  Nor  Envy  base,  nor  creeping  Gain, 
Dare  the  Muse's  walk  to  stain,  10 

While  bright-eyed  Science  watches  round ; 
Hence,  away,  'tis  holy  ground  !  " 

Recitative. 
From  yonder  realms  of  empyrean  day 
Bursts  on  my  ear  th'  indignant  lay ; 


AT  THE  INSTALLATION.  129 

There  sit  the  sainted  Sage,  the  Bard  divine, 

The  few,  whom  Genius  gave  to  shine 
Thro'    every    unborn   age,    and   undiscovered 
clime. 

Accompanied. 

Rapt  in  celestial  transport  they, 
Yet  hither  oft  a  glance  from  high 
They  send  of  tender  sympathy  20 

To  bless  the  place,  where  on  their  opening  soul 

First  the  genuine  ardour  stole. 
'Twas  Milton  struck  the  deep-toned  shell, 
And,  as  the  choral  warblings  round  him  swell, 
Meek  Newton's  self  bends  from  his  state  sub- 
lime, 
And  nods  his  hoary  head,  and  listens  to  the 
rhyme. 

Air. 

"  Ye  brown  o'er-arching  groves, 

That  Contemplation  loves, 
Where  willowy  Camus  lingers  with  delight! 

Oft  at  the  blush  of  dawn  30 

I  trod  your  level  lawn, 
Oft  wooed  the  gleam  of  Cynthia  silver-bright 


130  ODE  FOR  MUSIC 

In  cloisters  dim,  far  from  the  haunts  of  Folly, 
"With  Freedom  by  my  side,  and  soft-eyed  Mel- 
ancholy." 

Recitative. 

But  hark !  the  portals  sound,  and  pacing  forth, 

With  solemn  steps  and  slow. 
High  potentates,  and  dames  of  royal  birth, 
And  mitred  fathers  in  long  order  go ; 
Great  Edward,  with  the  lilies  on  his  brow 

From  haughty  Gallia  torn,  40 

And  sad  Chatillon,  on  her  bridal  morn 
That   wept  her  bleeding   Love,   and  princely 

Clare, 
And  Anjou's  Heroine,  and  the  paler  Rose, 
The  rival  of  her  crown  and  of  her  woes, 

And  either  Henry  there, 
The  murthered  saint,  and  the  majestic  lord 

That  broke  the  bonds  of  Rome. 

Accompanied. 

(Their  tears,  their  little  triumphs  o'er. 
Their  human  passions  now  no  more. 
Save  Charity,  that  glows  beyond  the  tomb.)  50 
All  that  on  Granta's  fruitful  plain 
Rich  streams  of  regal  bounty  poured, 


AT  THE  INSTALLATION.  131 

And  bad  these  awful  fanes  and  turrets  rise, 
To  hail  their  Fitzroy's  festal  morning  come  ; 
And  thus  they  speak  in  soft  accord 
The  liquid  language  of  the  skies  : — 

QUARTETTO. 

"  "What  is  grandeur,  what  is  power  ? 
Heavier  toil,  superior  pain. 
"What  the  bright  reward  we  gain  ? 
The  grateful  memory  of  the  good.  60 

Sweet  is  the  breath  of  vernal  shower, 
The  bee's  collected  treasures  sweet, 
Sweet  music's  melting  fall,  but  sweeter  yet 
The  still  small  voice  of  gratitude." 

Recitative. 

Foremost  and  leaning  from  her  golden  cloud 

The  venerable  Margaret  see  ! 
"  Welcome,  my  noble  son,  (she  cries  aloud) 

To  this,  thy  kindred  train,  and  me ; 
Pleased  in  thy  lineaments  we  trace 
A  Tudor's  fire,  a  Beaufort's  grace."  ^0 

Air. 

"  Thy  liberal  heart,  thy  judging  eye, 
The  flower  unheeded  shall  descry, 


132  ODE  FOR  MUSIC. 

And  bid  it  round  heaven's  altars  shed 
The  fragrance  of  its  blushing  head  ; 
Shall  raise  from  earth  the  latent  gem 
To  glitter  on  the  diadem." 

Kecitative. 

"  Lo  !     Granta  waits  to  lead  her  blooming  band, 

Not  obvious,  not  obtrusive,  she 
No  vulgar  praise,  no  venal  incense  flings  ; 

Nor  dares  with  courtly  tongue  refined       80 
Profane  thy  inborn  royalty  of  mind  ; 

She  reveres  herself  and  thee. 
With  modest  pride  to  grace  thy  youthful  brow, 
The  laureate  wreath,  that  Cecil  wore,  she  brings, 

And  to  thy  just,  thy  gentle  hand 

Submits  the  fasces  of  her  sway. 
While  spirits  blest  above  and  men  below 
Join  with  glad  voice  the  loud  symphonious  lay." 

Grand  Choeus. 
"  Thro'  the  wild  waves  as  they  roar, 

With  watchful  eye  and  dauntless  mien,      90 
Thy  steady  course  of  honour  keep, 
Nor  fear  the  rocks,  nor  seek  the  shore ; 
The  Star  of  Brunswick  smiles  serene, 
And  gilds  the  horrors  of  the  deep." 


AGRIPPINA.  133 


POSTHUMOUS  POEMS. 

XIII. 

AGRIPPINA. 

a  fragment  of  tragedy. 

Dramatis  Persons. 

AQRIPPINA  the  Empress-mother. 

Nero,  the  emperor. 

POPP^A,  believed  to  be  in  love  with  Otho. 

Otho,  a  young  man  of  quality,  in  love  with 

POPP^A. 

Seneca,  the  Emperor's  Preceptor. 
Anicetus,  Captain  of  the  Guards. 
Demetrius,  the  Cynic,  friend  to  Seneca, 
ACERONiA,  Confidant  to  Aorippina. 

Scene. — The  Emperor's  villa  at  Baice, 

The  Argument. 

The  drama  opens  with  the  indignation  of  Agrippina 
at  receiving  her  son's  orders  from  Anicetus  to  remov9 
from  Baiae,  and  to  have  her  guard  taken  from  her.  At 
this  time  Otho  having  conveyed  Poppaea  from  the  house 
of  her  husband  Rufus  Crispinus,  brings  her  to  Baiae, 
where  he  means  to  conceal  her  among  the  crowd  ;  or, 
if  his  fraud  is  discovered,  to  have  recourse  to  the 
Emperor's  authority  ;  but,  knowing  the  lawless  temper 
of  Nero  he  determines  not  to  have  recourse  to  that 


134  AGRIPPINA. 

expedient  but  on  the  utmost  necessity.  In  the  mean- 
time he  commits  her  to  the  care  of  Anicetus,  whom  he 
takes  to  be  his  friend,  and  in  whose  age  he  thinks  he 
may  safely  confide.  Nero  is  not  yet  come  yet  to  Baiae  ; 
but  Seneca,  whom  he  sends  before  him,  informs  Agrip- 
pina  of  the  accusation  concerning  Rubellius  Plancus, 
and  desires  her  to  clear  herself,  which  she  does  briefly, 
but  demands  to  see  her  son,  who,  on  his  arrival,  acquits 
her  of  all  suspicion,  and  restores  her  to  her  honours. 

In  the  mean  while,  Anicetus,  to  whose  care  Poppeea 
had  been  intrusted  by  Otho,  contrives  the  following 
plot  to  ruin  Agrippina ;  he  betrays  his  trust  to  Otho, 
and  brings  Nero,  as  it  were  by  chance,  to  the  sight  of 
the  beautiful  Poppaea.  The  Emperor  is  immediately 
struck  with  her  charms,  and  she,  by  a  feigned  resist- 
ance, increases  his  passion  ;  though,  in  reality,  she  is 
from  the  first  dazzled  with  the  prospect  of  empire 
and  forgets  Otho.  She  therefore  joins  with  Anicetus  in 
his  design  of  ruining  Agrippina,  soon  perceiving  that 
it  will  be  for  her  interest.  Otho  hearing  that  the 
Emperor  had  seen  Poppaea,  is  much  enraged ;  but 
not  knowing  that  this  interview  was  obtained  through 
the  treachery  of  Anicetus,  is  readily  persuaded  by  him 
to  see  Agrippina  in  secret,  and  acquaint  her  with  his 
fears  that  her  son  Nero  would  marry  Poppaea.  Agrip- 
pina, to  support  her  own  power,  and  to  wean  the 
Emperor  from  the  love  of  Poppaea,  gives  Otho  en- 
couragement, and  promises  to  support  him.  Anicetus 
secretly  introduces  Nero  to  hear  their  discourse  ;  who 
resolves  immediately  on  his  mother's  death,  and,  by 
Anicetus's  means,  to  destroy  her  by  drowning.  A 
solemn  feast,  in  honour  of  their  reconciliation,  is  to  be 
made  ;  after  which  she  being  to  go  by  sea  to  Bauli,  the 
the  ship  is  so  contrived  as  to  sink  or  crush  her ;  she 
escapes  by  accident,  and  returns  to  Baiae. 

In  this  interval  Otho  has  an  interview  vdth  Poppaea ; 


AGRIPPINA.  135 

and  being  duped  a  second  time  by  Anicetus  and  her, 
determines  to  fly  with  her  into  Greece,  by  means  of  a 
vessel  which  is  to  be  furnished  by  Anicetus  ;  but  he, 
pretending  to  remove  Poppaea  on  board  in  the  night, 
conveys  her  to  Nero's  apartment ;  she  there  encourages 
and  determines  Nero  to  banish  Otho,  and  finish  the 
horrid  deed  he  had  attempted  on  his  mother.  Ani- 
cetus undertakes  to  execute  his  resolves ;  and,  under 
pretence  of  a  plot  upon  the  Emperor's  life,  is  sent  with 
a  guard  to  murder  Agrippina,  who  is  still  at  Baiae  in 
imminent  fear,  and  irresolute  how  to  conduct  herself. 
The  account  of  her  death,  and  the  Emperor's  horror 
and  fruitless  remorse,  finishes  the  drama. 


ACT  I.     Scene  I. 

Agrippina.     Aceronia. 

Agrip.  'Tis  well,  begone  !  your  errand  is  per- 
formed, [^Sjyeaks  as  to  Anicetus  entering. 

The  message  needs  no  comment.  Tell  your 
master. 

His  mother  shall  obey  him.  Say  you  saw 
her 

Yielding  due  reverence  to  his  high  command ; 

Alone,  unguarded  and  without  a  lictor. 

As  fits  the  daughter  of  Germanicus. 

Say,  she  retired  to  Antium  ;  there  to  tend 

Her  household  cares,  a  woman's  best  employ- 
ment. 


136  AGRIPPINA. 

What  if  you  add,  how  she  turned  pale  and 

trembled  ; 
You  think,  you  spied  a  tear  stand  in  her  eye,  10 
And  would  have  dropped,  but  that  her  pride 

restrained  it  ? 
(  Go  !  you  can  paint  it  well )  'twill  profit  you, 
And  please  the  stripling.      Yet  'twould  dash 

his  joy. 
To  hear  the  spirit  of  Britannicus 
Yet  walks  on  earth  ;  at  least  there  are  who  know 
Without  a  spell  to  raise,  and  bid  it  fire 
A  thousand  haughty  hearts,  unused  to  shake 
When  a  boy  frowns,  nor  to  be  lured  with  smiles 
To  taste  of  hollow  kindness,  or  partake 
His  hospitable  board  ;  they  are  aware  20 

Of  the  unpledged  bowl,  they  love  not  aconite. 
Acer.    He's  gone  ;  and  much  I  hope  these 

walls  alone 
And  the  mute  air  are  privy  to  your  passion. 
Forgive  your    servant's    fears,    who   sees  the 

danger 
Which  fierce  resentment  cannot  fail  to  raise 
In  haughty  youth,  and  irritated  power. 
Agrip.  And  dost  thou  talk  to  me,  to  me,  of 

danger. 


AGRIPPINA.  137 

Of  haughty  youth  and  irritated  power, 
To  her  that  gave  it  being,  her  that  armed 
This  painted  Jove,  and  taught  his  novice  hand  30 
To  aim  the  forked  bolt  ;  while  he  stood  trem- 
bling, 
Scared  at  the  sound,  and  dazzled  with  its  bright- 
ness ? 
'Tis  like,  thou  hast  forgot,  when  yet  a  stranger 
To  adoration,  to  the  grateful  stream 
Of  flattery's  incense,  and  obsequious  vows 
From  voluntary  realms,  a  puny  boy, 
Decked  with  no  other  lustre  than  the  blood 
Of  Agrippina's  race,  he  lived  unknown 
To  fame,  or  fortune  ;  haply  eyed  at  distance 
Some  edileship,  ambitious  of  the  power  40 

To  judge  of  weights  and    measures  ;  scarcely 

dared 
On  Expectation's  strongest  wing  to  soar 
High  as  the  consulate,  that  empty  shade 
Of  long-forgotten  liberty  ;  when  I 
Oped  his  young  eye  to  bear  the  blaze  of  great- 
ness; 
Showed  him  where  empire  towered,  and  bade 

him  strike 
The  noble  quarry.     Gods  !  then  was  the  time 


138  AGRIPPINA. 

To  shrink  from  danger ;  fear  might  then  have 

worn 
The  mask  of  prudence  ;  but  a  heart  like  mine, 
A  heart  that  glows  with  the  pure  Julian  fire,  50 
If  bright  Ambition  from  her  craggy  seat 
Display  the  radiant  prize,  will  mount  undaunted. 
Gain  the  rough  heights,  and  grasp  the  dangerous 

honour. 
Acer.    Through  various  life  I  have  pursued 

your  steps. 
Have  seen  your    soul,    and    wondered  at   its 

daring  ; 
Hence  rise  my  fears.     Nor  am  I  yet  to  learn 
How  vast  the  debt  of   gratitude  which  Nero 
To  such  a  mother  owes  ;  the  world,  you  gave 

him. 
Suffices  not  to  pay  the  obligation. 

I  well  remember  too  (for  I  was  present)  60 
When  in  a  secret  and  dead  hour  of  night, 
Due  sacrifice  performed  with  barb'rous  rites 
Of  muttered  charms,  and  solemn  invocation. 
You  bade  the  Magi  call  the  dreadful  powers, 
That  read  futurity,  to  know  the  fate 
Impending  o'er  your  son ;  their  answer  was, 
If  the  son  reign,  the  mother  perishes. 


AGRIPPINA.  139 

Perish  (you  cried)  the  mother !  reign  the  son  ! 
He  reigns,  the  rest  is  heaven's ;  who  oft  has 

bad, 
Even  when  its  will  seemed  wrote  in  lines  of 

blood,  70 

Th'  unthought  event  disclose  a  whiter  meaning. 
Think  too  how  oft  in  weak  and  sickly  minds 
The  sweets  of  kindness  lavishly  indulged 
Rankle  to  gall  ;  and  benefits  too  great 
To  be  repaid,  sit  heavy  on  the  soul, 
As  unrequited  wrongs.     The  willing  homage 
Of  prostrate  Rome,  the  senate's  joint  applause, 
The  riches  of  the  earth,  the  train  of  pleasures 
That  wait  on  youth,  and  arbitrary  sway  ; 
These  were  your  gift,  and    with    them    you 

bestowed  80 

The  very  power  he  has  to  be  ungrateful. 
Agrip.  Thus   ever   grave   and   undisturbed 

reflection 
Pours  its  cool  dictates  in  the  madding  ear 
Of  rage,  and  thinks  to  quench  the  fire  it  feels 

not. 
Say'st  thou  I  must  be  cautious,  must  be  silent, 
And  tremble  at  the  phantom  I  have  raised  ? 
Carry  to  him  thy  timid  counsels.     He 


140  AGRIPPINA. 

Perchance  may  heed  'em.    Tell  him,  too,  that 


one. 


Who  had  such  liberal  power  to  give,  may  still, 
With  equal  po\Yer  resume  that  gift,  and  raise  90 
A  tempest  that  shall  shake  her  own  creation 
To  its  original  atoms — tell  me,  say  ! — 
This  mighty  emperor,  this  dreaded  hero. 
Has  he  beheld  the  glittering  front  of  war  ? 
Knows  his  soft  ear  the  trumpet's  thrilling  voice, 
And  outcry  of  the  battle  ?  Have  his  limbs 
Sweat  under  iron  harness  ?      Is  he  not 
The  silken  son  of  dalliance,  nursed  in  ease 
And  pleasure's    flowery  lap  ? — Rubellius  lives, 
And  Sylla  has  his  friends,  though  schooled  by 
fear  100 

To  bow  the  supple  knee,  and  court  the  times 
With  shows  of  fair  obeisance  ;  and  a  call, 
Like  mine,  might  serve  belike  to  wake  preten- 
sions 
Drowsier  than  theirs,  who    boast  the  genuine 

blood 
Of  our  imperial  house. 
Acer*  Did   I  not   wish  to   check  this  dan- 
gerous passion, 
*  From  line  82  to  the  end  was  one  continued  speech  ; 


AGRIPPINA.  141 

I  might  remind  my  mistress  that  her  nod 
Can  rouse  eight  hardy  legions,  wont  to  stem 
With  stubborn  nerves  the  tide,  and  face  the 

rigour 
Of   bleak  Germania's   snows.     Four,  not  less 
brave,  110 

That  in  Armenia  quell  the  Parthian  force 
Under  the  warlike  Corbula,  by  you 
Marked  for  their  leader;   these,  by    ties  con- 
firmed, 
Of  old  respect  and  gratitude,  are  yours. 
Surely  the  Masians  too,  and  those  of  Egypt, 
Have  not  forgot  your  sire  ;  the  eye  of  Rome 
And  the  Praetorian  camp  have  long  revered. 
With  customed  awe,  the  daughter,  sister,  wife, 
And  mother  of  their  Caesars. 

Agrip.  Ha  !  by  Juno, 

It  bears  a  noble  semblance.     On  this  base  120 
My  great  revenge  shall  rise  ;  or  say  we  sound 
The  trump  of  Liberty ;  there  will  not  want, 
Even  in  the  servile  senate,  ears  to  own 

as  Gray  thought  it  too  long,  Mason  broke  it  in  three 
places,  here  by  altering  this  passage  and  putting  it  into 
the  mouth  of  Aceronia,  and  by  inserting  two  lines  to  be 
epoken  by  her,  after  line  158,  and  at  line  162  ;  but  I 
have  removed  these  interpolations. — J,   B. 


142 


AGRIPPINA. 


Her  spirit-stirring  voice ;  Soranus  there, 
And  Cassius,  Vetus  too,  and  Thrasea, 
Minds  of  the  antique  cast,  rough,  stubborn  souls, 
That  struggle  with  the  yoke.     How  shall  the 

spark 
Unquenchable,  that  glows  within  their  breasts, 
Blaze  into  freedom,  when  the  idle  herd 
(Slaves  from  the  womb,  created  but  to  stare,  130 
And  bellow  in  the  Circus)  yet  will  start, 
And  shake  'em  at  the  name  of  Liberty, 
Stung  by  a  senseless  word,  a  vain  tradition, 
As  there  were  magic  in  it !     Wrinkled  beldams 
Teach  it  their  grandchildren,  as  somewhat  rare 
That  anciently  appeared,  but  when,  extends 
Beyond  their  chronicle — oh  !  'tis  a  cause 
To  arm  the  hand  of  childhood,  and  rebrace 
The  slackened  sinews  of  time-Avearied  age. 

Yes,  we  may  meet,  ingrateful  boy,  we  may  j 
Again  the  buried  Genius  of  old  Rome  141 

Shall  from  the  dust  uprear  his  reverend  head. 
Roused  by  the  shouts  of  millions  ;  there  before 
His  high  tribunal  thou  and  I  appear. 
Let  majesty  sit  on  thy  awful  brow. 
And  lighten  from  thy  eye  ;  around  the  call 
The  gilded  swarm  that  wantons  in  the  sunshine 


AGRIPPINA.  143 

Of  thy  full  favour  ;  Seneca  be  there 
In  gorgeous  phrase  of  laboured  eloquence    149 
To  dress  thy  plea,  and  Burrhus  strengthen  it. 
With   his    plain   soldier's    oath,   and    honest 

seeming. 
Against  thee,  Liberty  and  Agrippina  ; 
The  world,  the  prize ;  and  fair  befall  the  victors. 
But  soft !  why  do  I  waste  the  fruitless  hours, 
In  threats  unexecuted  ?     Haste  thee,  fly 
These  hated  waDs  that  seem  to  mock  my  shame 
And  cast  me  forth  in  duty  to  their  lord. 

My  thought  aches  at  him ;  not  the  basilisk 
More  deadly  to  the  sight,  than  is  to  me 
The  cool  injurious  eye  of  frozen  kindness.    160 
I  will  not  meet  its  poison.     Let  him  feel 
Before  he  sees  me.     Yes,  I  will  be  gone. 
But  not  to  Antium — all  shall  be  confessed, 
Whate'er  the  frivolous  tongue  of  giddy  fame 
Has  spread  among  the  crowd  ;  things,  that  but 

whispered 
Have  arched  the  hearer's  brow,  and  riveted 
His  eyes  in  fearful  ecstasy ;  no  matter 
What ;   so't  be   strange,    and   dreadful. — Sor- 
ceries, 
Assassinations,  poisonings — the  deeper 


144  AGRIPPINA. 

My  guilt,  the  blacker  his  ingratitude.  170 

And  you,  ye  manes  of  Ambition's  victims, 
Enshrined  Claudius,  with  the  pitied  ghosts 
Of  the  Syllani,  doomed  to  early  death, 
(Ye  unavailing  horrors,  fruitless  crimes !) 
If  from  the  realms  of  night  my  voice  ye  hear, 
In  lieu  of  penitence,  and  vain  remorse. 
Accept  my  vengeance.     Though  by  me  ye  bled. 
He  was  the  cause.     My  love,  my  fears  for  him, 
Dried  the  soft  springs  of  pit}"  in  my  heart. 
And  froze  them  up  with  deadly  cruelty.       180 
Yet  if  your  injured  shades  demand  my  fate. 
If  murder  cries  for  murder,  blood  for  blood. 
Let  me  not  fall  alone  ;  but  crush  his  pride, 
And  sink  the  traitor  in  his  mother's  ruin. 

[Exeunt 

Scene  II.     Otho,  Popp^ea. 

Otho.  Thus  far  we're  safe.     Thanks  to  the 
rosy  queen 
Of  amorous  thefts  ;  and  had  her  wanton  son 
Lent  us  his  wings,  we  could  not  have  beguiled 
With  more  elusive  speed  the  dazzled  sight 
Of  wakeful  jealousy.    Be  gay  securely  ;     189 
Dispel,  my  fair,  with  smiles,  the  tim'rous  cloud 


SONNET.  145 

That  hangs   on   thy   clear   brow.     So   Helen 

looked, 
So  her  white  neck  reclined,  so  was  she  borne 
By  the  young  Trojan  to  his  gilded  bark 
With  fond  reluctance,  yielding  modesty, 
And  oft  reverted  eye,  as  if  she  knew  not 
"Whether  she  feared,  or  wished  to  be  pursued. 


*  *  * 


XIV. 
SONNET 

ON  THE  DEATH  OF  KIOHAED  WEST. 

In  vain  to  me  the  smiling  Mornings  shine, 

And  reddening  Phoebus  lifts  his  golden  fire ; 
The  birds  in  vain  their  amorous  descant  join  ; 

Or  cheerful  fields  resume  their  green  attire ; 
These  ears,  alas  !  for  other  notes  repine, 

A  different  object  do  these  eyes  require  ; 
My  lonely  anguish  melts  no  heart  but  mine ; 

And  in  my  breast  the  imperfect  joys  expire. 
Yet  Morning  smiles  the  busy  race  to  cheer, 
And  new-born  pleasure  brings  to  happier 
men ;  10 


146  HYMN  TO  IGNORANCE. 

The  fields  to  all  their  wonted  tribute  bear ; 

To  warm  their  little  loves  the  birds  complain ; 
I  fruitless  mourn  to  him  that  cannot  hear, 

And  weep  the  more  because  I  weep  in  vain. 

At  /Stoke,  Aug.,  1742. 


XY. 
HYMN  TO  IGNORANCE. 

A  FKAGMENT. 

Hail,  horrors,  hail !  ye  ever  gloomy  bowers, 

Ye  gothic  fanes,  and  antiquated  towers. 

Where  rushy  Camus'  slowly-winding  flood 

Perpetual  draws  his  humid  train  of  mud ; 

Glad  I  revisit  thy  neglected  reign. 

Oh  take  me  to  thy  peaceful  shade  again. 

But  chiefly  thee,  whose  influence  breathed  from 

high 
Augments  the  native  darkness  of  the  sky ; 
Ah,  Ignorance!  soft  salutary  power! 
Prostrate  with  filial  reverence  I  adore.  10 

Thrice    hath    Hyperion    rolled    his    annual 

race, 


HYMN  TO  IGNORANCE.  147 

Since  weeping  I  forsook  thy  fond  embrace. 

Oh  say,  successful  dost  thou  still  oppose 

Thy  leaden  segis  'gainst  our  ancient  foes  ? 

Still  stretch,  tenacious  of  thy  right  divine, 

The  massy  sceptre  o'er  thy  slumb'ring  line? 

And    dews    Lethean    through   the    land  dis- 
pense 

Too  steep  in  slumbers  each  benighted  sense  ? 

If  any  spark  of  wit's  delusive  ray 

Break  out  and  flash  a  momentary  day,  20 

"With  damp,  cold  touch  forbid  it  to  aspire, 

And  huddle  up  in  fogs  the  dang'rous  fire. 
Oh  sav — she  hears  me  not,   but,  careless 
grown. 

Lethargic  nods  upon  her  ebon  throne. 

Goddess  !  awake,  arise !  alas,  my  fears  ! 

Can  powers  immortal  feel  the  force  of  years? 

Not  thus  of  old,  with  ensigns  wide  unfurled. 

She   rode     triumphant    o'er    the    vanquished 
world ; 

Fierce  nations  owned  her  unresisted  might. 

And  all  was  Ignorance,  and  all  was  Night,    30 
Oh  !  sacred  Age  !    Oh !  Times  for  ever  lost  I 

(The  Schoolman's  glory,  and  the  Churchman's 
boast.) 


148  THE  ALLIANCE  OF 

For  ever  gone — yet  still  to  Fancy  new, 

Her  rapid  wings  the  transient  scene  pursue, 

And  bring  the  buried  ages  back  to  view. 

High  on  her  car,  behold  the  grandam  ride 

Like  old  Sesostris  with  barbaric  pride  ; 

...  a  team  of  harnessed  monarchs  bend 
*  *  *  *  * 


XYI. 

THE  ALLIANCE  OF 

EDUCATION  AND  GOYEKNMENT. 


A  FRAGMENT. 


COMMENTARY.  * 


The  author's  subject  being  Tfie  necessary  Alliance 
between  a  good  Form  of  Government  and  a  good  Mode  of 
Education,  in  order  to  produce  the  Happiness  of  Man- 
kind, the  Poem  opens  with  two  similes  ;  an  uncommon 
kind  of  exordium  ;  but  which  I  suppose  the  poet  inten- 
tionally chose,  to  intimate  the  analogical  method  he 
meant  to  pursue  in  his  subsequent  reasonings. 

Ist,  He  asserts  that  men  without  education  are  like 
sickly  plants  in  a  cold  or  barren  soil  (1.  1  to  5,  and  8  to 
12)  ;  and  2dly,  he  compares  them,  when    unblest  with 

*  Formed  by  Mason,  "  on  carefully  reviewing  the 
scattered  papers  in  prose  which  he  writ,  as  hints  for  his 
own  use  in  the  prosecution  of  this  work." — Mason,  vol. 
iii.  p.  98. 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT.         149 

a  just  and  well-regulated  government,  to  plants  that 
will  not  blossom  or  bear  fruit  in  an  unkindly  and  in- 
clement air  (1.  5  to  9,  and  1.  13  to  22).  Having  thus  laid 
down  the  two  positions  he  means  to  prove,  he  begins  by 
examining  into  the  characteristics  which  (taking  a 
general  view  of  mankind)  all  men  have  in  common  one 
with  another  (1.  22  to  39)  ;  they  covet  pleasure  and 
avoid  pain  1.  31)  ;  they  feel  gratitude  for  benefits 
(1.  34)  ;  they  desire  to  avenge  wrongs,  which  they  effect 
either  by  force  or  cunning  (1.  35)  ;  they  are  linked  to 
each  other  by  their  common  feelings,  and  participate 
in  sorrow  and  in  joy  (1.  36,  37). 

If  then  all  the  human  species  agree  in  so  many  moral 
particulars,  whence  arises  the  diversity  of  national  char- 
acters ?  This  question  the  poet  puts  at  1.  38,  and  dilates 
upon  to  1.  64.  Why,  says  he,  have  some  nations  shown 
a  propensity  to  commerce  and  industry  ;  others  to  war 
and  rapine  ;  others  to  ease  and  pleasure  ?  (1.  42  to  46). 
"Why  have  the  northern  people  overspread,  in  all  ages, 
and  prevailed  over  the  southern?  (1.  46  to  58).  Why 
has  Asia  been,  time  out  of  mind,  the  seat  of  despotism, 
and  Europe  that  of  freedom?  (1.  59  to  64).  Are  we 
from  these  instances  to  imagine  men  necessarily  en- 
slaved to  the  inconveniences  of  the  climate  where  they 
were  born  ?  (1.  64  to  72).  Or  are  we  not  rather  to  sup- 
pose there  is  a  natural  strength  in  tlie  human  mind,  that 
is  able  to  vanquish  and  break  through  them?  (1.  72 
to  84). 

It  is  confessed,  however,  that  men  receive  an  early 
tincture  from  the  situation  they  are  placed  in,  and  the 
climate  which  produces  them  (1.  84  to  88).  Thus  the 
inhabitants  of  the  mountains,  inured  to  labour  and  pa- 
tience, are  naturally  trained  to  war  (1.  88  to  96) ;  while 
those  of  the  plain  are  more  open  to  any  attack,  and 
softened  by  ease  and  plenty  (1.  96  to  99).  Again,  the 
Egyptians,  from  the  nature  of  their  situation,  might 


22— G  &  O— U 


150  THE  ALLIANCE  OF 

be  the  inventors  of  home  navigation,  from  a  necessity 
of  keeping  up  an  intercourse  between  their  tovs^ns  dur- 
ing the  inundation  of  the  Nile  (1.  99,  etc.). 

Those  persons  would  naturally  have  the  first  turn  to 
commerce  who  inhabited  a  barren  coast  like  the 
Tyrians,  and  were  persecuted  by  some  neighbouring 
tyrant ;  or  were  drove  to  take  refuge  on  some  shoals, 
like  the  Venetian  and  Hollander ;  their  discovery  of 
some  rich  island,  in  the  infancy  of  the  world,  described. 
The  Tartar,  hardened  to  war  by  his  rigorous  climate  and 
pastoral  life,  and  by  his  disputes  for  water  and  herbage 
in  a  country  without  landmarks,  as  also  by  skirmishes 
between  his  rival  clans,  was  consequently  fitted  to  con- 
quer his  rich  southern  neighbours,  whom  ease  and  lux- 
ury had  enervated.  Yet  this  is  no  proof  that  liberty 
and  valour  may  not  exist  in  southern  climes,  since  the 
Syrians  and  Carthaginians  gave  noble  instances  of  both  ; 
and  the  Arabians  carried  their  conquests  as  far  as  the 
Tartars.  Rome  also  (for  many  centuries)  repulsed  those 
very  nations  which,  when  she  grew  weak,  at  length  de- 
molished her  extensive  empire. 

Essay  I. 

As  sickly  plants  betray  a  niggard  earth, 
Whose  barren  bosom  starves  her  generous  birth, 
Nor  genial  warmth,  nor  genial  juice  retains 
Their  roots  to  feed,  and  fill  their  verdant  veins ; 
And  as  in   climes,   where  Winter  holds  his 

reign. 
The  soil,  though  fertile,  will  not  teem  in  vain, 
Forbids  her  gems  to  swell,  her  shades  to  rise. 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT.         151 

Nor  trusts  her  blossoms  to  the  churlish  skies, 
So  draw  mankind  in  vain  the  vital  airs, 
Unformed,  unfriended,  by  those  kindly  cares,  10 
That  health  and  vigour  to  the  soul  impart, 
Spread   the   young   thought,   and    warm   the 
opening  heart. 

So  fond  Instruction  on  the  growing  powers 
Of  Nature  idly  lavishes  her  stores. 
If  equal  Justice  with  unclouded  face 
Smile  not  indulgent  on  the  rising  race. 
And  scatter  with  a  free  though  frugal  hand 
Light  golden  showers  of  plenty  o'er  the  land. 
But  Tyranny  has  fixed  her  empire  there, 
To  check   their  tender  hopes  with    chilling 
fear,  20 

And  blast  the  blooming  promise  of  the  year. . 

This  spacious  animated  scene  survey 
From  where  the  rolling  orb,  that  gives  the  day, 
His  sable  sons  with  nearer  course  surrounds, 
To  either  pole,  and  life's  remotest  bounds. 
How  rude  so  e'er  th'  exterior  form  we  find, 
Howe'er  Opinion  tinge  the  varied  mind. 
Alike  to  all  the  kind  impartial  Heaven 
The  sparks  of  truth  and  happiness  has  given  ; 
With  sense  to  feel,  with  memory  to  retain,    30 


152  THE  ALLIANCE  OF 

They  follow  pleasure,  and  they  fly  from  pain ; 

Their  judgment  mends  the  plan  their  fancy 
draws, 

Th'  event  presages,  and  explores  the  cause. 

The  soft  returns  of  gratitude  they  know, 

B}'-  fraud  elude,  by  force  repel  the  foe. 

While  mutual  wishes,  mutual  woes  endear 

The  social  smile,  and  sympathetic  tear. 
Say  then,  thro'  ages  by  what  fate  confined 

To   different   climes    seem   different   souls  as- 
signed ? 

Here  measured  laws  and  philosophic  ease    40 

Fix  and  improve  the  polished  arts  of  peace  ; 

There  Industry  and  Gain  their  vigils  keep. 

Command  the  winds,  and  tame  th'  unwilling 
deep. 

Here  Force  and  hardy  deeds  of  blood  prevail. 

There   languid  Pleasure   sighs   in  every  gale. 

Oft  o'er  the  trembling  nations  from  afar 

Has  Scythia  breathed  the  living  cloud  of  war ; 

And,   where  the  deluge  burst,   with  sweepy 
sway 

Their  arms,  their  kings,  their  gods  were  rolled 
away. 

As  oft  have  issued,  host  impelling  host,         50 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT.         153 

The  blue-eyed  myriads  from  the  Baltic  coast. 
The  prostrate  South  to  the  destroyer  yields 
Her  boasted  titles  and  her  golden  fields. 
With  grim  delight  the  brood  of  Winter  view 
A  brighter  day,  and  heavens  of  azure  hue ; 
Scent  the   new    fragrance   of    the   breathing 

rose, 
And  quaif  the  pendent  vintage  as  it  grows. 
Proud  of  the  yoke,  and  pliant  to  the  rod, 
Why  yet  does  Asia  dread  a  monarch's  nod, 
While  European  freedom  still  withstands     60 
Th'  encroaching  tide,  that  drowns  her  lessening 

lands, 
And  sees  far  off  with  an  indignant  groan, 
Her  native  plains,  and  empires  once  her  own. 
Can  opener  skies,  and  suns  of  fiercer  flame 
O'erpower  the  fire  that  animates  our  frame ; 
As  lamps,  that  shed  at  eve  a  cheerful  ray, 
Fade  and  expire  beneath  the  eye  of  day  ? 
Need  we  the  influence  of  the    northern  star 
To  string   our  nerves  and  steel  our  hearts  to 

war  ? 
And,  where  the  face  of  nature  laughs  around,  70 
Must  sick'ning  virtue  fly  the  tainted  ground  ? 
Unmanly  thought !  what  seasons  can  control, 


154  THE  ALLIANCE  OF 

What  fancied  zone  can  circumscribe  the  Soul, 
Who,  conscious  of  the  source  from,  whence  she 

springs, 
By  Reason's  light,  on  Resolution's  wings. 
Spite  of  her  frail  companion,  dauntless  goes 
O'er    Lib^'^a's   deserts   and   through   Zembla's 

snows  ? 
She  bids  each  slumb'ring  energy  awake, 
Another  touch,  another  temper  take, 
Suspends  th'  inferior  laws  that  rule  our  clay ;  80 
The  stubborn  elements  confess  her  sway. 
Their  little  wants,  their  low  desires,  refine, 
And  raise  the  mortal  to  a  height  divine. 

Not  but  the  human  fabric  from  the  birth 
Imbibes  a  flavour  of  its  parent  earth, 
As  various  tracts  enforce  a  various  toil, 
The  manners  speak  the  idiom  of  their  soil. 
An  iron-race  the  mountain-cliffs  maintain, 
Foes  to  the  gentler  genius  of  the  plain ; 
For  where  unwearied  sinews  must  be  found  90 
With   side-long    plough    to   quell   the    flinty 

ground, 
To  turn  the  torrent's  swift-descending  flood, 
To  brave  the  savage  rushing  from  the  wood, 
What  wonder,  if  to  patient  valour  trained 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT.         155 

They  guard  with  spirit  what  by  strength  they 

gained  ? 
And  while  their  rocky  ramparts  round  they 

see, 
The  rough  abode  of  want  and  liberty, 
(As  lawless  force  from  confidence  will  grow) 
Insult  the  plenty  of  the  vales  below  ?  99 

"What  wonder  in  the  sultry  climes,  that  spread 
Where  Nile  redundant  o'er  his  summer-bed 
From  his  broad  bosom  life  and  verdure  flings 
And  broods  o'er  Egypt  with  his  wat'ry  wings, 
If  with  adventurous  oar  and  ready  sail. 
The  dusky  people  drive  before  the  gale ; 
Or  on  frail  floats  to  distant  cities  ride, 
That  rise  and  glitter  o'er  the  ambient  tide  ? 


* 


"  I  found  also  among  these  papers  a  single  couplet, 
much  too  beautiful  to  be  lost,  though  the  place  wliere 
he  meant  to  introduce  it  cannot  be  ascertained." — 
Mason. 

When  love  could  teach  a  monarch  to  be  wise, 
And  gospel-light  first  dawned  from  Bullen's 
eyes. 


156      STANZAS  TO  MR  BENTLEY. 

XYII. 

STANZAS  TO  ME.  BENTLEY. 

In  silent  gaze  the  tuneful  choir  among, 
Half  pleased,  half  blushing,  let  the  Muse 
admire, 

While  Bentley  leads  her  sister-art  along. 
And  bids  the  pencil  answer  to  the  lyre. 

See,  in  their  course,  each  transitory  thought 
Fixed  by  his  touch  a  lasting  essence  take ; 

Each  dream,  in  fancy's  airy  colouring  wrought, 
To  local  symmetry  and  life  awake  !  8 

The  tardy  rhymes  that  used  to  linger  on. 
To  censure  cold,  and  negligent  of  fame, 

In  swifter  measures  animated  run. 

And  catch  a  lustre  from  his  genuine  flame. 

Ah  !  could  they  catch  his  strength,  his  easy 
grace, 

His  quick  creation,  his  unerring  line  ; 
The  energy  of  Pope  they  might  efface, 

And  Dryden's  harmony  submit  to  mine.    16 


STANZAS  TO  MR.  BENTLEY.  157 

But  not  to  one  in  this  benighted  age 

Is  that  diviner  inspiration  given, 
That  burns  in   Shakespeare's  or  in  Milton's 
page, 

The  pomp  and  prodigality  of  heaven. 

As,  when  conspiring  in  the  diamond's  blaze, 
The  meaner  gems,  that  singly  charm  the 
sight, 

Together  dart  their  intermingled  rays, 

And  dazzle  with  a  luxury  of  light.  24 

Enough  for  me,  if  to  some  feeling  breast 

My  lines  a  secret  sympathy  .  . 
And  as  their  pleasing  influence  .  o  o 

A  sigh  of  soft  reflection  .  .  o  o^ 


158  ODE  ON  VICISSITUDE. 


XVIII. 

ODE 

ON  THE  PLEASURE  ARISING  FROM 

VICISSITUDE. 

A    FRAGMENT. 

Now  the  golden  Morn  aloft 

Waves  her  dew- bespangled  wing. 

With  vermeil  cheek  and  whisper  soft 

She  woos  the  tardy  spring ; 
Till  April  starts,  and  calls  around 
The  sleeping  fragrance  from  the  ground  5 
And  lightly  o'er  the  living  scene 
Scatters  his  freshest,  tenderest  green. 

New-born  flocks,  in  rustic  dance, 

Frisking  ply  their  feeble  feet ;  10 

Forgetful  of  their  wintry  trance, 

The  birds  his  presence  greet ; 
But  chief,  the  sky -lark  warbles  high 
His  trembling  thrilling  ecstasy 
And,  lessening  from  the  dazzled  sight, 
Melts  into  air  and  liquid  light. 


ODE  ON  VICISSITUDE.  159 

Rise,  my  soul !  on  wings  of  fire, 

Rise  the  rapturous  choir  among ; 
Hark  !  'tis  Nature  strikes  the  lyre, 

And  leads  the  general  song.  20 

*  *  *  * 

Yesterday  the  sullen  year 

Saw  the  snowy  whirlwind  fly  ; 
Mute  was  the  music  of  the  air, 

The  Herd  stood  drooping  by ; 
Their  raptures  now  that  wildly  flow, 
No  yesterday,  nor  morrow  know  ; 
'Tis  man  alone  that  joy  descries 
With  forward  and  reverted  eyes. 

Smiles  on  past  Misfortune's  brow 

Soft  Reflection's  hand  can  trace ;  30 

And  o'er  the  cheek  of  Sorrow  throw 

A  melancholy  grace ; 
While  Hope  prolongs  our  happier  hour, 
Or  deepest  shades,  that  dimly  lower 
And  blacken  round  our  weary  way, 
Gilds  with  a  gleam  of  distant  day. 

Still,  where  rosy  Pleasure  leads. 
See  a  kindred  Grief  pursue  ; 


160  ODE  ON  VICISSITUDE. 

Behind  the  steps  that  Misery  treads,  ■ 

Approaching  Comfort  view  ;  40 

The  hues  of  Bliss  more  brightly  glow, 
Chastised  by  sabler  tints  of  woe  ; 
And  blended  form,  with  artful  strife, 
The  strength  and  harmony  of  Life. 

See  the  Wretch,  that  long  has  tost 

On  the  thorny  bed  of  Pain, 
At  length  repair  his  vigour  lost. 

And  breathe  and  walk  again  ; 
The  meanest  flowret  of  the  vale. 
The  simplest  note  that  swells  the  gale,  50 

The  common  Sun,  the  air,  the  skies, 
To  him  are  opening  Paradise. 

Humble  Quiet  builds  her  cell. 

Near  the  source  whence  Pleasure  flows ; 

She  eyes  the  clear  chrystalline  well, 

And  tastes  it  as  it  goes. 

***** 


EPITAPH  ON  MRS.  CLARKE.  161 


XIX. 

EPITAPH  ON  MES.  CLAEKE. 

Lo  1  where  this  silent  marble  weeps, 

A  Friend,  a  Wife,  a  Mother  sleeps ; 

A  heart,  within  whose  sacred  cell 

The  peaceful  virtues  loved  to  dwell. 

Affection  warm,  and  faith  sincere, 

And  soft  humanity  were  there. 

In  agony,  in  death,  resigned, 

She  felt  the  wound  she  left  behind, 

Her  infant  image  here  below 

Sits  smiling  on  a  father's  woe ;  10 

Whom  what  awaits,  while  yet  he  strays 

Along  the  lonely  vale  of  days? 

A  pang,  to  secret  sorrow  dear, 

A  sigh,  an  unavailing  tear  ; 

Till  time  shall  every  grief  remove 

With  life,  with  memory,  and  with  love. 


162  GRAY  ON  HIMSELF. 

XX. 

EPITAPH  ON  A  CHILD. 

Heee  freed    from   pain,  secure  from  misery, 

lies 
A  Child,  the  darling  of  his  parents'  eyes ; 
A  gentler  lamb  ne'er  sported  on  the  plain, 
A  fairer  flower  will  never  bloom  ao^ain ! 
Few  were  the  days  allotted  to  his  breath ; 
Here  let  him  sleep  in  peace  his  night  of  death. 


XXI. 
GKAY  ON  HIMSELF. 

WRITTEN  IN    1761,  AND    FOUND    IN    ONE    OF  HIS 
POCKET-BOOKS. 

Too  poor  for  a  bribe,  and  too  proud  to  im- 
portune ; 

He  had  not  the  method  of  making  a  fortune ; 

Could  love  and  could  hate,  so  was  thought 
somewhat  odd ; 


EPITAPH  ON  SIR  WILLIAM  WILLIAMS.     163 

No  very  great  wit,  he  believed  in  a  God. 
A  place  or  a  pension  he  did  not  desire, 
But  left  church  and  state  to  Charles  Townshend 
and  Squire. 


XXII. 

EPITAPH  ON  SIE  WILLIAM  WILLIAMS. 

Here,  foremost  in  the  dangerous  paths  of  fame, 
Young  Williams  fought  for   England's  fair 
renown  ; 
His  mind  each  Muse,  each  Grace  adorned  his 
frame, 
Nor  envy  dared  to  view  him  with  a  frown. 

At  Aix,  his  voluntary  sword  he  drew, 

There  first  in  blood  his  infant  honour  sealed 

From  fortune,  pleasure,  science,  love  he  flew. 
And  scorned  repose  when  Britain  took  the 
field. 

With  eyes  of  flame,  and  cool  undaunted  breast 
Victor  he  stood  on  Belleisle's  rocky  steeps — 

Ah,  gallant  youth  ;  this  marble  tells  the  rest. 
Where  melancholy  friendship  bends,  and 
weeps. 


164  THE  DEATH  OF  HOEL. 

XXIII. 

THE  DEATH  OF  HOEL. 

ANODE.       SELECTED    FROM   THE  GODODIN. 

Had  I  but  the  torrent's  might, 

With  headlong  rage  and  wild  affright 

Upon  De'ira's  squadrons  hurled, 

To  rush,  and  sweep  them  from  the  world  I 

Too,  too  secure  in  youthful  pride, 
By  them  my  friend,  my  Hoel,  died, 
Great  Clan's  son ;  of  Madoc  old 
He  asked  no  heaps  of  hoarded  gold ; 
Alone  in  nature's  wealth  arrayed, 
He  asked  and  had  the  lovely  maid.  10 

To  Cattraeth's  vale  in  glitt'ring  row 
Thrice  two  hundred  warriors  go ; 
Every  warrior's  manly  neck 
Chains  of  regal  honour  deck, 
Wreathed  in  many  a  golden  link ; 
From  the  golden  cup  they  drink 
Nectar  that  the  bees  produce, 


I 


CONAN.  165 

Or  the  grape's  ecstatic  juice. 

Flushed  with  mirth  and  hope  they  burn ; 

But  none  from  Cattraeth's  vale  return,  20 

Save  Aeron  brave,  and  Conan  strong, 

(Bursting  through  the  bloody  throng) 

And  I,  the  meanest  of  them  all. 

That  live  to  weep  and  sing  their  fall. 


xxiy. 

CARADOC. 


Have  ye  seen  the  tusky  boar, 
Or  the  bull,  with  sullen  roar, 
On  surrounding  foes  advance  ? 
So  Caradoc  bore  his  lance. 


XXY. 
CONAK. 


Conan's  name,  my  lay,  rehearse, 
Build  to  him  the  lofty  verse, 
Sacred  tribute  of  the  bard. 
Verse,  the  hero's  sole  reward. 


166  THE  CANDIDATE. 

As  the  flame's  devouring  force ; 
As  the  whirlwind  in  its  course; 
As  the  thunder's  fiery  stroke, 
Glancing  on  the  shivered  oak  ; 
Did  the  sword  of  Conan  mow 
The  crimson  harvest  of  the  foe.        10 


XXYI. 
THE  CANDIDATE, 

OR  THE    CAMBRIDGE    COURTSHIP. 

When  sly  Jemmy  Twitcher  had  smugged  up 
his  face. 

With  a  lick   of  court  white-wash,   and  pious 
grimace, 

A  wooing  he  went,  where  three  sisters  of  old 

In  harmless  society  guttle  and  scold. 

"  Lord !  sister,"  says  Physic  to  Law,  "  I  de- 
clare, 

Such  a  sheep-biting   look,  such  a  pick-pocket 
air! 

Not    I  for  the  Indies! — You   know  I'm    no 
prude, — 


THE  CANDIDATE.  167 

But  his  nose  is  a  shame, — and  his  eyes  are  so 

lewd! 
Then  he  shambles  and  straddles  so  oddly-rl 

fear —  9 

No — at  our  time  of  life  'twould  be  silly,  my 

dear." 
"  I  don't  know,"  says  Law,  "  but  methinks 

for  his  look, 
'Tis  just  like  the  picture  in  Kochester's  book  ; 
Then  his  character,  Phyzzy, — his   morals — his 

life— 
When  she  died,  I  can't  tell, — but  he  once  had 

a  wife. 
They  say  he's  no  Christian,  loves  drinking  and 

whoring. 
And  all  the  town  rings  of  his  swearing  and 

roaring ! 
And   filching   and   lying,    and    Newgate-bird 

tricks  ; — 
Not  I — for  a  coronet,  chariot  and  six." 

Divinity  heard,  between  waking  and  dozing, 
Her  sisters  denying,  and  Jemmy  proposing ;  ?.0 
From  table  she  rose,  and  with  bumper  in  hand, 
She  stroked  up  her  belly,  and  stroked  down  her 

band — 


168  VERSES  FROM  SHAKESPEARE. 

"  What  a  pother  is  here  about  ■wenching  and 
roaring ! 

Why,  David  loved  catches,  and  Solomon  whor- 
ing ; 

Did  not  Israel  filch  from  the  Egyptians  of  old 

Their  jewels  of  silver  and  jewels  of  gold  ? 

The  prophet  of  Bethel,  we  read,  told  a  lie ; 

He  drinks — so  did  Noah  ; — he  swears — so  do  I ; 

To  reject  him  for  such  peccadillos,  were  odd  ;  29 

Besides,  he  repents — for  he  talks  about  God — 
To  Jemmy : — 

Never  hang  down  your  head,  you  poor  penitent 
elf, 

Come  buss  me — I'll  be  Mrs.  Twitcher  myself." 


*  * 


XXYII. 

YERSES  FROM  SHAKESPEARE. 

To  Mrs.  Anne,  Regular  Servant  to  the  Rev. 
Mr.  Precentor  of  York. 

A  moment's  patience,  gentle  Mistress  Anne  ; 
(But  stint  your  clack  for  sweet  St.  Charitie) 


VERSES  FROM  SHAKESPEARE.  169 

'Tis  Willy  begs,  once  a  right  proper  man, 
Though  now  a  book,  and  interleaved  you  see. 

Much    have    I    borne   from  cankered  critic's 
spite, 

From  fumbling  baronets  and  poets  small. 
Pert  barristers,  and  parsons  nothing  bright. 

But  what  awaits  me  now  is  worst  of  all.     8 

'Tis  true,  our  master's  temper  natural 
Was  fashioned  fair  in  meek  and  dove-like 
guise ; 

But  may  not  honey's  self  be  turned  to  gall 
By  residence,  by  marriage,  and  sore  eyes  ? 

If  then  he  wreak  on  me  his  wicked  will ; 

Steal  to  his  closet  at  the  hour  of  prayer ; 
And    (when  thou   hear'st    the    organ  piping 
shrill) 
Grease   his  best  pen,  and   all  he  scribbles, 
tear. 

Better  to  bottom  tarts  and  cheesecakes  nice,  17 
Better  the  roast  meat  from  the  fire  to  save, 

Better  be  twisted  into  caps  for  spice. 
Than  thus  be  patched  and  cobbled  in  one's 
grave. 


170  IMPROMPTU. 

So  York  shall  taste  what  Clouet  never  knew, 
So  from  our  work  sublimer  fumes  shall  rise ; 

"While  Nancy  earns  the  praise  to  Shakespeare 
due, 
For  glorious  puddings  and  immortal  pies.  24 


XXYIII. 
IMPROMPTU. 

SUGGESTED  BY  A  VIEW,  IN  1766,  OF  THE  SEAT  AND 
KUINS  OF  A  DECEASED  NOBLEMAN,  AT  KINGS- 
GATE,  KENT. 

Old,  and  abandoned  by  each  venal  friend. 
Here  Holland  formed  the  pious  resolution 

To  smuggle  a  few  years,  and  strive  to  mend 
A  broken  character  and  constitution. 

On  this  congenial  spot  he  fixed  his  choice  ; 
Earl  Goodwin  trembled   for  his  neighbour- 
ing sand  ; 
Here  sea-gulls  scream,  and  cormorants  rejoice, 
And  mariners,  though  shipwrecked,  dread  to 
land. 


IMPROMPTU.  171 

Here  reign  the  blustering  North  and  blighting 
East, 

No  tree  is  heard  to  whisper,  bird  to  sing  ; 
Yet  Nature  could  not  furnish  out  the  feast, 

Art  he  invokes  new  horrors  still  to  bring. 

Here  mouldering  fanes  and  battlements  arise, 
Turrets  and  arches  nodding  to  their  fall 

Unpeopled  monast'ries  delude  our  eyes, 

And  mimic  desolation  covers  all.  16 

"  Ah  ! "  said    the   sighing   peer,     "  had   Bute 
been  true, 
NorMungo's,  Rigby's,  Bradshaw's  friendship 
vain, 
Far  better  scenes   than  these    had  blest    our 
view, 
And  realised  the  beauties  which  we  feign  ; 

"  Purged  by  the  sword,  and  purified  by  fire, 
Then   had   we   seen  proud  London's  hated 
walls ; 

Owls  would  have  hooted  in  St.  Peter's  choir,23 
And  foxes  stunk  and  littered  in  St.  Paul's.'* 


172     SATIRE  ON  THE  HEADS  OF  HOUSES. 


XXIX. 


SATIRE   ON  THE  HEADS  OF  HOUSES ; 


OR,  NEVER  A  BARREL  THE  BETTER  HERRING. 


O  Cambridge,  attend 
To  the  Satire  I've  penned 
On  the  Heads  of  thy  Houses, 
Thou  Seat  of  the  Muses ! 


Know  the  Master  of  Jesus 
Does  hugely  displease  us ; 
The  Master  of  Maudlin 
In  the  same  dirt  is  dawdling  ; 
The  Master  of  Sidney 
Is  of  the  same  kidney ; 
The  Master  of  Trinity 
To  him  beare  affinity  ; 
As  the  Master  of  Keys 
Is  as  like  as  two  pease, 
So  the  Master  of  Queen's 
Is  as  like  as  two  beans ; 
The  Master  of  Kings 
Copies  them  in  all  things ; 


10 


SATIRE  ON  THE  HEADS  OF  HOUSES.      173 

The  Master  of  Catherine 

Takes  them  all  for  his  pattern  ;  20 

The  Master  of  Clare 

Hits  them  all  to  a  hair  ; 

The  Master  of  Christ 

By  the  rest  is  enticed  ; 

But  the  Master  of  Emmanuel 

Follows  them  like  a  spaniel ; 

The  Master  of  Benet 

Is  of  the  like  tenet ; 

The  Master  of  Pembroke 

Has  from  them  his  system  took ;  30 

The  Master  of  Peter's 

Has  all  the  same  features ; 

The  Master  of  St.  John's 

Like  the  rest  of  the  Dons. 


As  to  Trinity  Hall 
We  say  nothing  at  alL 


B2— G  &  0—^ 


174 


AMATORY  LINES. 


XXX. 
AMATOKY   LINES. 

With  beauty,  with  pleasure  surrounded,  to  lan- 
guish— 

To  weep  without  knowing  the  cause  of  my  an- 
guish ; 

To  start  from  short  slumbers,  and  wish  for  the 
morning — 

To  close  my  dull  eyes  when  I  see  it  returning ; 

Sighs  sudden  and  frequent,  looks  ever  de- 
jected— 

Words  that  steal  from  ray  tongue,  by  no  mean- 
ing connected  ! 

Ah!  say,  fellow-swains,  how  these  symptoms 
befell  me  ? 

They  smile,  but  reply  not — Sure  Delia  will  tell 
me  I 


EPITAPH  ON  MRS.  MASON.  175 

XXXI. 
SONG. 

Thyesis,  when  we  parted,  swore 
Ere  the  spring  he  would  return — 

Ah  !  what  means  yon  violet  flower! 
And  the  buds  that  deck  the  thorn  I 

'Twas  the  lark  that  upward  sprung  I 

'Twas  the  nightingale  that  sung  1 

Idle  notes !  untimely  green  ! 

Why  this  unavailing  haste  ? 
Western  gales  and  skies  serene 

Speak  not  always  winter  past. 
Cease,  my  doubts,  my  fears  to  move, 
Spare  the  honour  of  my  love. 


XXXII. 

EPITAPH  ON  MRS.  MASON. 

Tell  them,  though  'tis  an  awful  thing  to  die, 
*Twas  e'en  to  thee,  yet,  the  dread  path  once 

trod. 
Heaven  lifts  its  everlasting  portals  high. 
And  bids  the  pure  in  heart  behold  their  God. 


176  COMIC  LINES. 

XXXIII. 
TOPHET. 

Thus  Tophet  looked ;  so  grinned  the  brawling 
fiend, 

While  frighted  prelates  bowed  and  called  him 
friend  ; 

I  saw  them  bow,  and  while  they  wished  him 
dead. 

With  servile  simper  nod  the  mitred  head. 

Our  mother-church,  with  half-averted  sight, 

Blushed  as  she  blessed  her  grisly  proselyte  ; 

Hosannas  rung  through  hell's  tremendous  bor- 
ders, 

And  Satan's  self  had  thoughts  of  taking  orders. 


XXXIY. 
COMIC  LINES. 

Weddell  attends  your  call,  and  Palgrave  proud, 
Stonehewer  the  lewd,  and  Delaval  the  loud. 
For  thee  does    Powell  squeeze,  and  Marriot 
sputter, 


IMPROMPTUS.  177 

And  Glynn   cut   phizzes,   and    Tom    Neville 

stutter. 
Brown  sees  thee  sitting  on  his  nose's  tip, 
The  Widow  feels  thee  in  her  aching  hip ; 
For  thee  fat  Nanny  sighs,  and  handy  Nelly, 
And  Balguy  with  a  bishop  in  his  belly. 


XXXV. 

IMPROMPTUS. 

These  scraps  of  verse  and  extempore  rhymes  were 
preserved  by  "Wharton,  and  were  first  printed  by  Mit- 
ford  (vol.  V.  pp.  185,  186),  who  describes  them  as 
"sportive  effusions  by  Gray  in  a  post-chaise,  when 
travelling  with  his  friend  Dr.  Wharton." 

Impromptu  by    Gray  on  going    out  of  Raby  Castle, 
after  dining  with  Harry  Vane. 

Here  lives  Harry  Yane, 
Yery  good  claret  and  fine  champaign. 


Epigrams  on  Dr.  Keene,  Bishop  of  Chester. 

The  Bishop  of  Chester, 
Though  wiser  than  Nestor 


178  IMPROMPTUS. 

And  fairer  than  Esther, 

If  you  scratch  him  will  fester. 

One  day  the  Bishop  having  offered  to  give  a  gentle- 
man a  goose,  Gray  composed  his  Epitaph,  thus  : — 

Here  lies  Edmund  Keene  Lord  Bishop  of  Ches- 
ter, 
He  eat  a  fat  goose,  and  could  not  digest  her. 

And  this  upon  his  Lady  : — 

Here  lies  Mrs.  Keene  the  she  Bishop  of  Chester, 
She  had  a  bad  face  which  did  sadly  molest  her. 


Parody  on  an  Epitaph. 

This  parody  was  made  on  a  tour  with  Dr.  Wharton 
in  Cumberland  and  Westmoreland  in  September,  1767. 
Wharton  made  a  copy  of  the  lines  and  added  the  fol- 
lowing note: — "Extempore  Epitaph  on  Ann  Countess 
of  Dorset,  Pembroke  and  Montgomery,  made  by  Mr. 
Gray  on  reading  the  Epitaph  on  her  mother's  tomb  in 
the  Church  at  Appleby,  composed  by  the  Countess  in 
the  same  manner." 

Now  clean,   now  hideous,  mellow  now,  now 

gruff. 
She  swept,  she  hissed,  she  ripened  and  grew 

rough, 


IMPROMPTUS.  179 

At     Brougham,     Pendragon,     Appleby    and 
Brough. 


A  Couplet  on  Dining. 

"When  you  rise  from  your  dinner  as  light  as 

before, 
Tis  a  sign  you  have  eat  just  enough  and  no 

more. 

Couplet  about  Birds. 

Norton  Nicholls  in  his  Reminiscences  of  Gray  gives 
the  following  as  "  two  verses  made  by  Mr.  Gray  as 
we  were  walking  in  the  spring  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Cambridge."  This  couplet  was  first  printed  in  Mathias' 
edition  of  Gray's  Works  (1814),  vol.  ii,  p.  596. 

There  pipes  the  woodlark,  and  the  song-thrush 

there 
Scatters  his  loose  notes  in  the  waste  of  air. 


180 


DOUBTFUL  POEMS. 


DOUBTFUL  POEMS. 
I. 

ODE. 

Seeds  of  poetry  and  rhime 
Nature  in  my  soul  implanted ; 

But  the  genial  hand  of  time 
Still  to  ripen  'em  is  wanted ; 

Or,  soon  as  they  begin  to  blow, 

My  cold  soil  nips  the  buds  with  snow. 


6 


If  a  plenteous  crop  arise, 

Copious  numbers,  swelling  grain  ; 

Judgment  from  the  harvest  flies 

And  careless  spares  to  weed  the  plain  ; 

Tares  of  similes  choke  the  roots. 

Or  poppy -thoughts  blast  all  the  shoots.      12 

Youth,  his  torrid  beams  that  plays, 

Bids  the  poetic  Spirit  flourish  ; 
But,  tho'  flowers  his  ardour  raise. 

Maggots  too  'twill  form  and  nourish  ; 
And  variegated  Fancy's  seen 
Vainly  enamelling  the  green.  18 


DOUBTFUL  POEMS.  181 

First  when  Pastorals  1  read, 
Purling  streams  and  cooling  breezes 

I  only  wrote  of ;  and  my  head 
Khimed  on,  reclined  beneath  the  tree-zes ; 

In  pretty  Dialogue  I  told 

Of  Phoebus'  heat  and  Daphne's  cold.        24 

Battles,  sieges,  men,  and  arms,' 

(If  heroic  verse  I'm  reading) 
I  burn  to  write  ;  with  Myra's  charms 

In  episode,  to  show  my  breeding ; 
But  if  my  Myra  cruel  be 
I  tell  her  so  in  Elegy.  30 

Tragic  numbers,  buskined  trains, 

If  Melpomene  inspire, 
I  sing ;  but  fickle  throw  my  trains 

And  half  an  act  into  the  fire ; 
Perhaps  Thalia  prompts  a  Sonnet 
On  Chloe's  fan,  or  Caelia's  bonnet.  36 

For  one  silk- worm  thought  that  thrives 

Twenty  more  in  embryo  die  ; 
Some  spin  away  their  little  lives 

In  ductile  lines  of  foolery ; 


182  POETICAL  RONDEAU. 

Then  for  one  raoiety  of  the  year 

Pent  in  a  chrysalis  appear.  42 

Till  again  the  rolling  sun 

Bursts  the  inactive  shell,  and  thoughts 
Like  butterflies  their  prison  shun, 

Buzzing  with  all  their  parent  faults ; 
And,  springing  from  the  sluggish  mould, 
Expand  their  wings  of  flimsy  gold.  48 

But,  my  Dear,  these  flies,  they  say, 
Can  boast  of  one  good  quality  ; 

To  Phoebus  gratefully  they  pay 
Their  little  songs,  and  melody ; 

So  I  to  you  this  trifle  give. 

Whose  influence  first  bid  it  live.  54 

December,  1736.  Celadon. 


II. 

POETICAL  EONDEAIJ. 

J 


First  to  love, — and  then  to  part,— > 


Long  to  seek  a  mutual  heart, — 
Late  to  find  it ; — and,  again. 
Leave  and  lose  it, — oh  the  pain  I 


POETICAL  RONDEAU.  183 

Some  have  loved,  and  loved  (they  say) 
'Till  they  loved  their  love  away  ; 
Then  have  left,  to  love  anew ; 
But,  I  wot,  they  loved  not  true  !  8 

True  to  love, — and  then  to  part, — 
Long  to  seek  a  mutual  heart, — 
Late  to  find  it, — and,  again, 
Leave,  and  lose  it, — oh  the  pain ! 

Some  have  loved,  to  pass  the  time. 
And  have  loved  their  love  in  rhyme ; 
Loathed  the  love  ;  and  loathed  the  song ; 
But  their  love  could  not  be  strong.      16 

Strong  to  love, — and  then  to  part, — 
Long  to  seek  a  mutual  heart, — 
Late  to  find  it, — and,  again, 
Leave,  and  lose  it, — oh  the  pain ! 

Some  have  just  but  felt  the  flame 
Lightly  lambent  o'er  their  frame, — 
Light  to  them  the  parting  knell ; 
For,  too  sure,  they  love  not  well.        24 

Well  to  love, — and  then  to  part, — 
Long  to  seek  a  mutual  heart, — 


184  THE  ALPHABET. 

Late  to  find  it,  and,  again, 
Leave  and  lose  it, — oh  the  pain! 

But  when  once  the  potent  dart 
Cent'ring,  rivets  heart  to  heart, 
'Tis  to  tear  the  closing  wound, 
Then  to  sever  what  is  hound.  32 

Bound  to  love, — and  then  to  part, 
Long  to  seek  a  mutual  heart, — 
Late  to  find  it, — and,  again, 
Leave  and  lose  it, — oh !  the  pain. 


IIL 


THE   CHARACTERS  OF  THE    CHRIST- 

CROSS  ROW. 

***** 

Great  D  draws  near — the    Duchess  sure  is 

come. 
Open  the  doors  of  the  withdrawing-room  ; 
Her  daughters  decked  most  daintily  I  see, 
The  Dowager  grows  a  perfect  double  D. 
E  enters  next,  and  with  her  Eve  appears, 


THE  ALPHABET.  185 

Not  like  yon  Dowager  deprest  with  years ; 
What  Ease  and  Elegance  her  person  grace, 
Bright  beaming,  as  the  Evening-star,  her  face; 
Queen  Esther  next — how  fair  e'en  after  death. 
Then  one  faint  glimpse  of  Queen  Elizabeth  ;  10 
No  more,   our  Esthers  now  are  nought  but 

Hetties, 
Elizabeths  all  dwindled  into  Betties  ; 
In  vain  you  think  to  find  them  under  E, 
They're  all  diverted  into  H  and  B. 
F  follows  fast  the  fair — and  in  his  rear, 
See  Folly,  Fashion,  Foppery,  straight  appear, 
All  with  fantastic  clews,  fantastic  clothes, 
With   Fans   and    Flounces,   Fringe   and   Fur- 
belows. 
Here  Grub-street  Geese  presume  to  joke  and 

jeer, 
All,  all,  but  Grannara  Osborne's  Gazetteer.  20 
High  heaves  his  hugeness  H,  methinks  we  see, 
Henry  the  Eighth's  most  monstrous  majesty, 
But  why  on  such  Tnock  grandeur  should  we 

dwell, 
H  mounts  to  Heaven,  and  H  descends  to  Hell, 
As  H  the  Hebrew  found,  so  I  the  Jew, 
See  Isaac,  Joseph,  Jacob,  pass  in  view; 


186  THE  ALPHABET. 

The  walls  of  old  Jerusalem  appear, 

See  Israel,  and  all  Judah  thronging  there. 

*  *  *  * 

P  pokes  his  head  out,  yet  has  not  a  pain ;  29 
Like  Punch,  he  peeps,  but  soon  pops  in  again ; 
Pleased  with  his  Pranks,  the  Pisgys  call  him 

Puck, 
Mortals  he  loves  to  prick,  and  pinch  and  pluck  ; 
Now  a  pert  Prig,  he  perks  upon  your  face, 
Now    peers,   pores,    ponders,    with    profound 

grimace. 
Now  a  proud  Prince,  in  pompous  Purple  drest, 
And  now  a  Player,  a  Peer,  a  Pimp,  or  Priest ; 
A  Pea,  a  Pin,  in  a  perpetual  round. 
Now  seems  a  Penny,  and  now  shows  a  Pound  ; 
Like  Perch  or  Pike,  in  Pond  you  see  him  come, 
He  in  plantations  hangs  like  Pear  or  Plum,  40 
Pippin  or  Peach  ;  then  perches  on  the  spray, 
In  form  of  Parrot,  Pye,  or  Popinjay. 
P,  Proteus-like  all  tricks,  all  shapes  can  show, 
The  Pleasantest  Person  in  the  Christ-Cross  row. 
As  K  a  King,  Q  represents  a  Queen, 
And  seems  small  difference  the  sounds  between ; 
K,  as  a  man,  with  hoarser  accents  speaks, 


THE  ALPHABET.  187 

In  shriller  notes  Q  like  a  female  squeaks  ; 
Behold  K  struts,  as  might  a  King  become, 
Q  draws  her  train  along  the  Drawing-room,  50 
Slow  follow  all  the  quality  of  State, 
Queer  Queensbury  only  does  refuse  to  wait. 
Thus  great  R  reigns  in  town,  while  different  far, 
Bests  in  Retirement,  little  Rural  R  ; 
Remote  from  cities  lives  in  lone  Retreat, 
With  Rooks   and   Rabbit-burrows   round   his 

seat — 
S  sails  the  Swan  slow  down  the  Silver  stream. 
*  *  *  * 

So  big  with  Weddings,  waddles  W, 
And  brings  all  Womankind  before  your  view  ; 
A  Wench,  a  Wife,  a  Widow,  and  a  Whore,    60 
With  Woe  behind,  and  Wantonness  before. 


188  TRANSLATIONS. 


TRANSLATIONS. 
I. 

FROM  STATIUS. 

Then  thus  the  King  * : — 

Whoe'er  the  quoit  can  wield, 
And  furthest  send  its  weight  athwart  the  field, 
Let  him  stand  forth  his  brawny  arm  to  boast. 
Swift  at  the  word,  from  out  the  gazing  host, 
Young  Pterelas  with  strength  unequal  drew. 
Laboring,   the   disc,    and  to    small    distance 

threw. 
The  band  around  admire  the  mighty  mass, 
A  slipp'ry  weight,  and  formed  of  polished  brass. 
The  love  of  honour  bade  two  youths  advance,  10 
Achaians  born,  to  try  the  glorious  chance ; 
A  third  arose  of  Acarnania  he, 
Of  Pisa  one,  and  one  from  Ephyre ; 
Nor  more,  for  now  Nesimachus's  son,  f — 
By  acclamations  roused,  came  tow 'ring  on. 
Another  orb  upheaved  his  strong  right  hand, 
*Adra8tus.  t  Hippomedon. 


FROM  STATIUS.  189 

Then  thus :    "  Ye  Argive  flower,  ye   warlike 

band, 
Who  trust  your  arms  shall  raise  the   Tyrian 

towers, 
And  batter  Cadmus'  walls  with  stony  showers, 
Keeeive  a  worthier  load ;  yon  puny  ball         20 

Let  youngsters  toss :  " 

He  said,  and  scornful  flung  th'  unheeded  weight 
Aloof ;  the  champions,  trembling  at  the  sight, 
Prevent  disgrace,  the  palm  despaired  resign  ; "» 
All  buu  two  youths  th'  enormous  orb  decline, 
These  conscious  shame  withheld,  and  pride  of 

noble  line. 

As  bright  and  huge  the  spacious  circle  lay, 
"With  double  light  it  beamed  against  the  day ; 
So  glittering  shows  the  Thracian  Godhead's 

shield, 
"With  such  a  gleam  affrights  Pangaea's  field,  30 
When  blazing  'gainst  the  sun  it  shines   from 

far. 
And,  clashed,  rebellows  with  the  din  of  war. 
Phlegyas  the  long-expected  play  began. 
Summoned  his  strength,  and  called  forth  all 

the  man. 
All  eyes  were  bent  on  his  experienced  hand, 


y 


190  TRANSLATIONS. 

For  oft  in  Pisa's  sports,  his  native  land 
Admired  that  arm,  oft  on  Alpheus'  shore 
The  pond'rous  brass  in  exercise  he  bore  ; 
Where  flowed  the  widest  stream  he  took  his ' 

stand ; 
Sure  flew  the  disc  from  his  unerring  hand,  40 
Nor  stopped  till  it  had  cut  the  further  strand. . 
And  now  in  dust  the  polished  ball  he  rolled, 
Then  grasped  its  weight,  elusive  of  his  hold ; 
Now  fitting  to  his  gripe  and  nervous  arm. 
Suspends  the  crowd  with  expectation  warm ; 
Nor  tempts  he  yet  the  plain,  but  hurled  upright, 
Emits  the  mass,  a  prelude  of  his  might ; 
Firmly  he  plants  each  knee,  and  o'er  his  head, 
Collecting  all  his  force,  the  circle  sped  ; 
It  towers  to  cut  the  clouds ;  now  through  the 

skies  50 

Sings  in  its  rapid  way,  and  strengthens  as   it 

flies; 
Anon,  with   slackened   rage   comes   quiv'ring 

down. 
Heavy  and  huge,  and  cleaves  the  solid  ground. 
So  from  th'   astonished   stars,   her   nightly 

train. 
The  sun's  pale  sister,  drawn  by  magic  strain, 


FROM  STATIUS.  191 

Deserts  precipitant  her  darkened  sphere  ; 
In  vain  the  nations  with  officious  fear 
Their  cymbals  toss,  and  sounding  brass  explore  ; 
Th'  JEmonian  hag  enjoys  her  dreadful  hour,  59 
And  smiles  malignant  on  the  labouring  power. 

Thehdidos  vi.  646-688. 

***** 

Third  in  the  labours  of  the  disc  came  on, 
With  sturdy  step  and  slow,  Hippomedon  ; 
Artful  and  strong  he  poised   the   w^ell-known 

weight, 
By  Phlegyas  warned,  and  fired  by  Mnestheus' 

fate, 
That  to  avoid,  and  this  to  emulate. 
His  vigorous  arm  he  tried  before  he  flung, 
Braced  all  his  nerves,  and  every  sinew  strung; 
Then,  with  a  tempest's  whirl,  and  wary  eye. 
Pursued  his  cast,  and  hurled  the  orb  on  high ; 
The  orb  on  high  tenacious  of  its  course,         10 
True  to  the  mighty  arm  that  gave  it  force, 
Far  overleaps  all  bound,  and  joys  to  see 
Its  ancient  lord  secure  of  victory. 
The  theatre's  green  height  and  woody  wall 
Tremble  ere  it  precipitates  its  fall ; 


192  TRANSLATIONS. 

The   ponderous   mass   sinks   in  the   cleaving 

ground, 
While  vales  and  woods  and  echoing  hills  re- 
bound. 
As  when,  from  Etna's  smoking  summit  broke, 
The  eyeless  Cyclops  heaved  the  craggy  rock  ; 
Where  Ocean  frets  beneath  the  dashing  oar,  20 
And  parting  surges  round  the  vessel  roar ; 
'Twas  there  he  aimed  the  meditated  harm, 
And  scarce  Ulysses  scaped  his  giant  arm. 
A  tiger's  pride  the  victor  bore  away. 
With  native  spots  and  artful  labour  gay, 
A  shining  border  round  the  margin  rolled, 
And  calmed  the  terrors  of  his  claws  in  gold. 

Thehdidos  vi.  704-724. 
Cambridge,  May  g,  1736. 


II. 

FROM  TASSO. 

♦'  Preser  commiato :  e  si  '1  desir  gli  sprona,"  etc. 

Dismissed  at  length,  they  break   through  all 

delay 
To  tempt  the  dangers  of  the  doubtful  way ; 


FROM  TASSO.  193 

And  first  to  Ascalon  their  steps  they  bend, 
Whose  walls  along  the  neighbouring  sea  ex- 
tend, • 
Nor  yet  in  prospect  rose  the  distant  shore ; 
Scarce  the  hoarse  waves  from  far  were  heard 

to  roar. 
When  thwart  the  road  a  river  rolled  its  flood 
Tempestuous,  and  all  further  course  withstood  ; 
The  torrent  stream  his  ancient  bounds  disdains, 
Swoll'n  with  new  force,   and   late-descending 
rains.  10 

Irresolute  they  stand  ;  when  lo  !  appears 
The  wondrous  Sage ;  vigorous  he   seemed   in 

years. 
Awful  his  mien,  low  as  his  feet  there  flows 
A  vestment  unadorned,  though  white  as  new- 

fall'n  snows ; 
Against  the  stream  the  waves  secure  he  trod, 
His  head  a  chaplet  bore,  his  hand  a  rod. 

As  on  the  Rhine,  when  Boreas'  fury  reigns. 
And  winter  binds  the  floods  in  icy  chains. 
Swift  shoots  the  village-maid  in  rustic  play,  19 
Smooth,  without  step,  adown  the  shining  way, 
Fearless  in  long  excursion  loves  to  glide. 
And  sports  and  wantons  o'er  the  frozen  tide. . 


194  TRANSLATIONS. 

So  moved  the  Seer,  but  on  no  hardened  plain ; 
The  river  boiled  beneath,  and  rushed  towards 

the  main. 
Where  fixed  in  wonder  stood  the  warlike  pair, 
His  course  he  turned,  and  thus  relieved  their 
care : 

"  Vast,  oh  my  friends,  and  difficult  the  toil 
To  seek  your  Hero  in  a  distant  soil ! 
No  common  helps,  no  common  guide  ye  need, 
Art  it  requires,  and  more  than  winged  speed.  30 
What  length  of  sea  remains,  what  various  lands. 
Oceans  unknown,  inhospitable  sands  ! 
For  adverse  fate  the  captive  chief  has  hurled 
Beyond  the  confines  of  our  narrow  world. 
Great  things  and  full  of  wonder  in  your  ears 
I  shall  unfold  ;  but  first  dismiss  your  fears  ; 
Nor  doubt  with  me  to  tread  the  downward  road 
That  to  the  grotto  leads,  my  dark  abode." 

Scarce  had  he  said,  before  the  warrior's  eyes 
When  mountain-high  the  waves  disparted  rise ; 
The  flood  on  either  hand  its  billows  rears. 
And  in  the  midst  a  spacious  arch  appears. 
Their  hands  he  seized,  and  down  the  steep  he 

led 
Beneath  the  obedient  river's  inmost  bed; 


FROM  TASSO.  195 

The  wat'ry  glimmerings  of  a  fainter  day 
Discovered  half,  and  half  concealed  their  way  ; 
As  when  athwart  the  dusky  woods  by  night 
The  uncertain  crescent  gleams  a  sickly  light. 
Through  subterraneous  passages  they  went,  49 
Earth's  inmost  cells,  and  caves  of  deep  descent. 
Of  many  a  flood  they  viewed  the  secret  source, 
The  birth  of  rivers  rising  to  their  course, 
Whate'er  with  copious  train  its  channel  fills, 
Floats  into  lakes,  and  bubbles  into  rills  ; 
The  Po  was  there  to  see,  Danubius'  bed, 
Euphrates'  fount,  and  Nile's  mysterious  head. 
Further  they  pass,  where  ripening  minerals  flow. 
And  embryon  metals  undigested  glow, 
Sulphureous  veins  and  living  silver  shine,      59 
Which   soon   the   parent  sun's   warm   powers 

refine. 
In  one  rich  mass  unite  the  precious  store. 
The  parts  combine  and  harden  into  ore  ; 
Here  gems  break  through  the  night  with  glit- 
tering beam, 
And  paint  the  margin  of  the  costly  stream ; 
All  stones  of  lustre  shoot  their  vivid  ray. 
And  mix  attempered  in  a  various  daj'^ ; 
Here  the  soft  emerald  smiles  of  verdant  hue, 


196  TRANSLATIONS. 

And  rubies  flame,  with  sapphires  heavenly  blue, 

The  diamond    there  attracts   the  wond'ring 

sight,* 

Proud  of  its  thousand  dies,  and  luxury  of  light.f 

Gerus.  Lib.  xiv.  32. 
1738. 


III. 

IMITATED  FROM  PROPERTIUS4 

LiBEK  III.  Elegia  5. 

"Pacis  amor  Deus  est,"  etc. 

Love,   gentle   Power !    to  Peace   was  e'er    a 

friend ; 
Before  the  Goddess'  shrine  we  too,  Love's  vo- 

t'ries,  bend. 
Still  may  his  Bard  in  softer  fights  engage ; 
Wars  hand  to  hand  with  Cynthia  let  me  wage. 
*  *  *  * 

*  Lines  68  and  69  have  been  incorrectly  printed  in  all 
previous  editions. 

f  See  Stanzas  to  Bentley,  24. 

X  In  the  Pembroke  MSS.  this  translation  from  Pro- 
pertius  is  as  here  and  not  in  the  form  ia  winch  Mr. 
Gosse  prints  it. 


FROM  PROPERTIUS.  197 

Long  as  of  youth  the  joyous  hours  remain, 

Me  may  Castalia's  sweet  recess  detain, 

Fast  by  th'  umbrageous  vale  lulled  to  repose, 

Where  Aganippe  warbles  as  it  flows  ; 

Or  roused  by  sprightly  sounds  from  out  the 

trance, 
I'd  in  the  ring  knit  hands,  and  join  the  Muses' 

dance. 
Gi'v'e  me   to  send  the  laughing  bowl  around. 
My  soul  in  Bacchus'  pleasing  fetters  bound  ; 
Let  on  this  head  unfading  flowers  reside, 
There  bloom  the  vernal  rose's  earliest  pride ;  10 
And  when,  our  flames  commissioned  to  destroy, 
Age  step  'twixt  Love  and  me,  and  intercept  the 

joy; 

When  my  changed  head  these  locks  no  more 

shall  know, 
And  all  its  jetty  honours  turn  to  snow ; 
Then  let  me  rightly  spell  of  Nature's  ways ; 
To  Providence,  to  Hira  my  thoughts  I'd  raise, 
Who  taught   this  vast  machine  its  steadfast 

laws. 
That  first,  eternal,  universal  Cause ; 
Search  to  what  regions  yonder  star  retires, 
That  monthly  waning  hides  her  paly  fires,  20 


22— Q  &  G— W 


198  TRANSLATIONS. 

And  whence,  anew  revived,  with  silver  light 
Relumes  her  crescent  orb  to  cheer  the  dreary 

night  ; 
How  rising  winds  the  face  of  ocean  sweep, 
"Where  lie  th'  eternal  fountains  of  the  deep, 
And  whence  the  cloudy  magazines  maintain 
Their  wintry  war,  or  pour  the  autumnal  rain 
How  flames  perhaps,  with  dire  confusion  hurled, 
Shall  sink  this  beauteous  fabric  of  the  world  ; 
What  colours  paint  the  vivid  arch  of  Jove ;  29 
What  wondrous  force  the  solid  earth  can  move, 
When  Pindus'  self  approaching  ruin  dreads, 
Shakes   all   his   pines,  and  bows  his   hundred 

heads ; 
Why  does  yon  orb,  so  exquisitely  bright. 
Obscure  his  radiance  in  a  short-lived  night ; 
Whence  the  Seven  Sisters'  congregated  fires, 
And  what  Bootes'  lazy  waggon  tires 
How  the  rude  surge  its  sandy  bounds  control ; 
Who  measured   out  the    year,   and  bad  the 

seasons  roll ; 
If  realms  beneath  those  fabled  torments  know, 
Pangs  without  respite,  fires  that  ever  glow,  40 
Earth's  monster-brood  stretched  on  their  iron 

bed, 


FROM  PROPERTIUS.  199 

The  hissing  terrors  round  Alecto's  head, 
Scarce  to  nine  acres  Tityus'  bulk  confined, 
The  triple  dog  that  scares  the  shadowy  kind, 
All  angry  heaven  inflicts,  or  hell  can  feel. 
The  pendent  rock,  Ixion's  whirling  wheel. 
Famine  at  feasts,  and  thirst  amid  the  stream ; 
Or  are  our  fears  th'  enthusiast's  empty  dream, 
And  all  the  scenes,  that  hurt  the  grave's  repose. 
But  picture  horror  and  poetic  woes.  50 

These  soft  inglorious  joys  my  hours  engage  ; 
Be  love  my  youth's  pursuit,  and  science  crown 

my  Age. 
You  whose  young  bosoms  feel  a  nobler  flame 
Eedeem  what  Crassus  lost,  and  vindicate  his 

name. 
*  December,  1738. 


200 


TRANSLATIONS. 


IV. 


TO   M^CENAS.* 

FROM    PROPERTIUS.       LIB.    II.    ELEG.    5. 

You  ask,  why  thus  my  Loves  I  still  rehearse, 
Whence    the    soft    strain    and     ever-melting 

verse  ? 
From  Cynthia  all  that  in  my  numbers  shines ; 
She  is  my  Genius,  she  inspires  the  lines ; 
No  Phoebus  else,  no  other  Muse  I  know. 
She  tunes  my  easy  rhime,  and  gives  the  lay  to 

flow. 
If  the  loose  curls  around  her  forehead  play, 
Or  lawless,  o'er  their  ivory  margin  stray ; 
If  the  thin  Coan  web  her  shape  reveal,  9 

And  half  disclose  the  limbs  it  should  conceal ; 
Of  those  loose  curls,  that  ivory  front  I  write  ; 
Of  the  dear  web  whole  volumes  I  indite  ; 
Or  if  to  music  she  the  lyre  awake, 


*The  whole  of  this  is  in  Gray's  handwriting  in  the 
Pembroke  MS.,  which  is  here  followed.  The  first 
thirty  lines  are  in  the  Mitford  MSS.,  the  remainder 
first  nppeared  in  Mathias'  edition. 


TO  M^CENAS.  201 

That  the  soft  subject  of  my  song  I  make, 
And  sing  with  what  a  careless  grace  she  flings 
Her  artful  hand  across  the  sounding  strings. 
If  sinking  into  sleep  she  seem  to  close 
Her  languid  lids,  I  favour  her  repose 
With  lulling  notes,  and  thousand  beauties  see 
That  slumber  brings  to  aid  my  Poetry.  20 

When,  less  averse,  and  yielding  to  desires. 
She  half  accepts,  and  half  rejects,  my  fires, 
While  to  retain  the  envious  lawn  she  tries. 
And  struggles  to  elude  my  longing  eyes. 
The  fruitful  Muse  from  that  auspicious  night 
Dates  the  long  Iliad  of  the  amorous  fight. 
In  brief  whate'er  she  do,  or  say,  or  look, 
'Tis  ample  matter  for  a  lover's  book  ; 
And  many  a  copious  narrative  you'll  see 
Big  with  the  important  Nothing's   History.  30 
Yet  would  the  tyrant  Love  permit  me  raise 
My  feeble  voice,  to  sound  the  victor's  praise, 
To  paint  the  hero's  toil,  the  ranks  of  war. 
The  laurelled  triumph  and  the  sculptured  car ; 
No  giant  race,  no  tumult  of  the  skies, 
No    mountain-structures   in  my   verse  should 

rise. 
Nor  tale  of  Thebes,  nor  Ilium  there  should  be, 


202  TRANSLATIONS. 

Nor  how  the  Persian  trod  the  indignant  sea ; 
Not  Marius'  Cimbrian  wreaths  would   I  relate, 
Nor  lofty  Carthage  struggling  with  her  fate.  40 
Here  should  Augustus  great  in  Arms,  appear, 
And  thou  Maecenas,  be  my  second  care ; 
Here  Mutina  from  flames  and  famine  free. 
And  there  the  ensanguined  wave  of  Sicily, 
And  sceptred  Alexandria's  captive  shore, 
And  sad  Philippi,  red  with  Roman  gore  ;  * 
Then,  while  the  vaulted  skies  loud  los  rend, 
In  golden  chains  should  loaded  monarchs  bend, 
And  hoary  Nile  with  pensive  aspect  seem 
To     mourn     the     glories    of    his     sevenfold 

stream,  50 

While  prows,  that  late  in  fierce  encounter  met, 
Move  through   the   Sacred   Way   and   vainly 

threat. 
Thee  too  the  Muse  should  consecrate  to  fame, 
And  with  his  garlands  weave  thy  ever-faithful 

name. 
But  nor  Callimachus'  enervate  strain 
May  tell  of  Jove,  and  Phlegra's  blasted  plain 
Nor  I  with  unaccustomed  vigour  trace 

*  These  two  lines  are  in  the  margin  in  the  Pembroke 
MS. 


TO  Mu^CENAS.  203 

Back  to  its  source  divine  the  Julian  race. 

Sailors  to  tell  of  winds  and  seas  delight, 

The  shepherd  of  his  flocks,  the  soldier  of  the 

fight,  60 

A  milder  warfare  I  in  verse  display ; 
Each  in  his  proper  art  should  waste  the  day ; 
Nor  thou  my  gentle  calling  disapprove, 
To  die  is  glorious  in  the  bed  of  Love. 
Happy  the  youth,  and  not  unknown  to  Fame, 
Whose  heart  has  never  felt  a  second  flame. 
Oh,  might  that  envied  happiness  be  mine ! 
To  Cynthia  all  my  wishes  I  confine  ; 
Or  if,  alas !  it  be  my  fate  to  try 
Another  Love,  the  quicker  let  me  die.  70 

But  she,  the  Mistress  of  my  faithful  breast, 
Has  oft  the  charms  of  constancy  confest, 
Condemns  her  fickle  sex's  fond  mistake. 
And  hates  the  Tale  of  Troy  for  Helen's  sake. 
Me  from  myself  the  soft  enchantress  stole  ; 
Ah !  let  her  ever  my  desires  control, 
Or  if  I  fall  the  victim  of  her  scorn. 
From   her  loved  door  may  my  pale  corse  be 

borne. 
The  power  of  herbs  can  other  harms  remove. 
And  find  a  cure  for  every  ill,  but  love.  80 


20t  TRANSLATIONS. 

The  Melian's  *  hurt  Machaon  could  repair, 
Heal  the  slow  chief,  and  send  again  to  war ; 
To  Chiron   Phoenix  owed  his  long-lost  sight, 
And  Phoebus'  son  recalled  Androgeon  to   the 

light. 
Here  arts  are  vain,  e'en  magic  here  must  fail, 
The  powerful  mixture  and  the  midnight  spell ; 
The  hand  that  can  my  captive  heart  release, 
And  to  this  bosom  give  its  wonted  peace, 
May  the  long  thirst  of  Tantalus  allay, 
Or  drive  the  infernal  vulture  from  his  prey.  90 
For  ills  unseen  what  remedy  is  found, 
Or  who  can  probe  the  undiscovered  wound  ? 
The  bed  avails  not,  or  the  leech's  care, 
Nor  changing  skies  can  hurt,  nor  sultry  air. 
'Tis  hard  th'  elusive  symptoms  to  explore ; 
To-day    the    lover    walks,    to-morrow  is    no 

more ; 
A  train  of  mourning  friends  attend  his  pall, 
And  wonder  at  the  sudden  funeral. 

When  then  my  Fates  that  breath  they  gave 

shall  claim, 

*  Gray  first  wrote  '  Lemnian's,'  but  corrected  it  in 
the  margin  (Pembroke  MS.).  Mathias  printed  '  Lem- 
nian's,' and  was  followed  by  Mitford  and  Moultrie. 


FROM  DANTE.  205 

"When  the  short  marble  but  preserve  a  name,  100 
A  little  verse  my  all  that  shall  remain  ; 
Thy  passing  courser's  slackened  speed  restrain ; 
(Thou  envied  honour  of  thy  poet's  days, 
Of  all  our  youth  the  ambition  and  the  praise !) 
Then  to  my  quiet  urn  awhile  draw  near, 
And  say,  while  o'er  the  place  you  drop  a  tear, 
Love  and  the  Fair  were  of  his  life  the  pride  ; 
He  lived,  while  he   was  kind ;  and  when  she 
frowned,  he  died. 

April,  1743. 


V. 

TRANSLATION  FROM  DANTE. 

This  translation  was  first  printed  by  Mr.  Gosse  (Ed. 
1884),  from  a  MS.  in  the  handwriting  of  Mitford,  in  the 
possession  of  Lord  Houghton.  Mr.  Gosse  states  that 
"the  holograph  of  Gray,  which  cannot  now  be  traced, 
is  said  to  have  been  sold  for  £18  in  1845." 

I  have  followed  the  copy  made  by  Mitford  (Mitford 
MSS.)  fron  Stonehewer.     Mitford's  note  is  :— 

"  It  is  uncertain  when  Gray  translated  the  following 
from  Dante,  but  most  probably  very  early,  and  when 
he  was  making  himself  master  of  the  Italian  lan- 
guage." 

From  his  dire  food  the  grisly  Felon  raised 
His  gore-dyed  lips,  which  on  the  clottered  locks 


206 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Of  th'  half  devoured  head  he  wiped,  and  thus 
Began.    Wouldst  thou  revive  the  deep  despair, 
The  anguish,  that  unuttered  nathless  wrings 
My  inmost  heart  ?  yet  if  the  telling  may 
Beget  the  traitor's  infamy,  whom  thus 
I  ceaseless  gnaw  insatiate ;  thou  shalt  see  me 
At  once  give  loose  to  utterance,  and  to  tears. 
I  know  not,   who  thou  art ;   nor  on  what 
errand  10 

Sent  hither ;  but  a  Florentine  my  ear, 
"Won  by  thy  tongue,  declares  thee.    Know,  thou 

seest 
In  me  Count  Ugolino,  and  Euggieri, 
Pisa's  perfidious  Prelate  this ;  now  hear 
My  wrongs,  and  from  them  judge  of  my  re- 
venge. 
That  I  did  trust  him,  that  I  was  betrayed 
By  trusting,  and  by  treachery  slain,  it  recks 

not 
That  I  advise  thee.     That  which  yet  remains 
To  thee  and  all  unknown  (a  horrid  tale) 
The  bitterness  of  death,  I  shall  unfold.  20 

Attend,  and  say  if  he  have  injured  me. 
Thro'  a  small  crevice  opening,  what  scant 
light 


FROM  DANTE.  207 

That  grim  and  antique  tower  admitted  (since 
Of  me  the  Tower  of  Famine  hight,  and  known 
To  many  a  wretch)  already  gan  the  dawn 
To  send  ;  the  whilst  I  slumb'ring  lay,  a  Sleep 
Prophetic  of  my  woes  with  direful  hand 
Oped  the  dark  veil  of  Fate.     I  saw  methought 
Toward  Pisa's  Mount,  that  intercepts  the  view 
Of  Lucca,  chased    by  hell-hounds   gaunt  and 

bloody  30 

A  wolf  full-grown  ;  with  fleet  and  equal  speed 
His  young    ones  ran  beside   him.      Lanfranc 

there 
And  Sigismundo,  and  Gualandi  rode 
Amain,  my  deadly  foes!  headed  by  this 
The  deadliest.     He  their  chief,  the  foremost  he 
Flashed  to  pursue,  and  cheer  the  eager  cry  ; 
Nor  long  endured  the  chase ;  the  panting  sire, 
Of  strength  bereft,  his  helpless  offspring  soon 
O'erta'en  beheld,  and  in  their  trembling  flanks 
The   hungry  pack  their  sharp-set   fangs   em- 

brued,  40 

The  morn  had  scarce  commenced,  when  I 

awoke  ; 
My  children  (they  were  with  me)  sleep  as  yet 
Gave  not  to  know  their  sum  of  misery, 


208  TRANSLATIONS. 

But  yet  in  low  and  uncompleted  sounds 

I  heard   'em  wail  for   bread.    Oh !   thou  art 

cruel, 
Or  thou  dost  mourn  to  think,  what  my  poor 

heart 
Foresaw,  foreknew  ;  oh  !  if  thou  weep  not  now, 
Where  are  thy  tears  ?  too  soon  they  had  aroused 

'em  48 

Sad  with  the  fears  of  sleep,  and  now  the  hour 
Of  timely  food  approached ;  when  at  the  gate 
Below  I  heard  the  dreadful  clank  of  bars. 
And  fast'ning  bolts ;  then   on  my   children's 

eyes 

Speechless  my  sight  I.  fixed,  nor  wept,  for  all 
Within  was  stone ;  they  wept,  unhappy  boys ! 
They  wept,  and  first  my  little  dear  Anselmo 
Cried,    'Father,    why,    why  do  you  gaze  so 

sternly  ? 
W^iat  would  you  have  ? '  yet  wept  I  not,  or 

answered 
All  that  whole  day,  or  the  succeeding  night 
Till  anew  sun  arose  with  weakly  gleam,        59 
And  wan,  such  as  mought  entrance  find  within 

51.   Mr.  Gosse  has  '  clash  '  instead  of  '  clank' ;  'e'er' 
for  '  ere,'  74  ;  '  hunger  '  for  '  famine,'  81. 


FROM  DANTE.  £09 

That  House  of  Woe.    But  oh !  when  I  beheld 
My  sons,  and  in  four  faces  saw  my  own 
Despair  reflected,  either  hand  I  gnawed 
For  anguish,  which  they    construed  hunger; 

straight 
Arising  all  they  cried,  '  Far  less  shall  be 
Our  suffering.  Sir,  if  you  resume  your  gift ; 
These  miserable  limbs  with  flesh  you  clothed ; 
Take  back,  what  once  was  yours.'     I  swallowed 

down 
My  struggling  sorrow,  not  to  heighten  theirs ; 
That  day,  and  yet  another,  mute  we  sate,      70 
And  motionless.     Oh  Earth  !  could'st  thou  not 

gape 
Quick  to  devour  me  ?  yet  a  fourth  day  came 
When  Gaddo,  at  my  feet  out-stretched,  implor- 
ing 
In  vain  my  help,  expired  ;  ere  the  sixth  morn 
Had   dawned,  my  other  three  before  my  eyes 
Died  one  by  one ;  I  saw  'em  fall ;  I  heard 
Their    doleful    cries ;   for  three  days  more  I 

groped 
About  among  their  cold  remains  (for  then 
Hunger   had  reft   my   eye-sight),   often  call- 
ing 


210  TRANSLATIONS. 

On  their  dear  names,  that  heard  me  now  no 

more ;  80 

The  fourth,  what  sorrow  could  not,  famine  did. 

He  finished.     Then  with  unrelenting  eye 
Askance  he  turned  him,  hasty  to  renew 
The  hellish  feast,  and  rent  his  trembling  prey. 

DeW  Inferno^  Canto  32. 


211 


LATIN  POEMS  AND  VERSES. 

I. 
PLAY-EXERCISE  AT  ETON. 

First  printed  in  Mr.  Gosse's  edition,  1884,  '  from 
Gray's  autograph  in  the  Stonehewer  collection, '  i.  e., 
Gray's  Commonplace  Books  (Pembroke  MSS.).  It 
is  here  given  correctly  therefrom.'  In  the  Index  it  is 
entitled  '  Knowledge  of  Himself,  Latin  Verses  at  Eton.' 

"  Quern  te  Deus  esse 
Jussit,   Sc    humana   qvia    parte  locatus  es  in  re 
Disce .  .  ." 

Pendet   Homo    incertus   geraini   ad    confinia 

mundi 
Cui  parti  accedat  dubius  ;  consurgere  stellis 
An  socius  velit,  an  terris  ingloria  moles 
Reptare,  ac  rauto  se  cum  grege  credere  cam  pis  ; 
Inseruisse  choro  divum  hie  se  jactat,  &  audet 
Telluremque  vocare  suam,  fluctusque    polum- 

que, 
Et  quodcunque  videt,  proprios  assumit  in  usus. 
'  Me  propter  jam  vere  expergefacta  virescit 
'  Natura  in  flores,  herbisque  illudit,  amatque 
*  Pingere  telluris  gremium,  miiii  vinea  foetu  10 


212  LATIN  POEMS. 

'  Purpureo  turget,  dulcique  rubescit  honore  ; 

'  Me  rosa,  me  propter  liquidos  exhalat  odores  ; 

'  Luna   mihi   pallet,   mihi   Olympum   Pbcebus 
inaurat, 

'  Sidera  mi  lucent,  volvunturque  jequora  ponti.' 
Sic  secum  insistit,  tantumque  bsec  astra  de- 
cores 

^stiraat  esse  suae  sedis,  convexaque  coeli 

Ingentes  scenas,  vestique  aulaea  theatri. 

At  tibi  per  deserta  fremit,   tibi  tigris  acer- 
bum 

Succenset,  nemorum  fulmen,   Gangeticus  hor- 
ror ?  19 

Te  propter   mare  se  tollit,  surgitque  tumultu  ? 
Hie  ubi  rimari,  atque  impallescere  libris 

Perstitit,  anne  valet  qua  vi  connexa  per  aevum 

Conspirent  elementa  sibi,  serventque  tenorem  ; 

Sufficiant  scatebrse   unde    mari,   fontesque  pe- 
rennes 

Jugis  aquae  fluviis,  unde  aether  sidera  pascat, 

Pandere?  nequaquam  ;  secreta  per  avia  mundi 

Debile  carpit  iter,  vix,  et  sub  luce  maligna 

Pergit,  et  incertam  tendit  trepidare   per  um- 
brara. 

Fata  obstant ;  metam  Parcae  posuere  sciendi, 


PLAY-EXERCISE  AT  ETON.  213 

Et  dixere,  veni   hue,    Doctrina,   hie  terminus 

esto.  30 

Non  super  aethereas  errare  licentius  auras 
Humanum  est,  at  scire  hominem  ;  breve  iimite 

votum 
Exiguo  claudat,  nee  se  quaesiverit  extra. 
Errat,  qui  eupit  oppositos  transcendere  fines, 
Extenditque  manus  ripse  ulterioris  amore  : 
Illic?  gurges  liiat  late,  illie  saeva  vorago 
Et  caligantes  longis  ambagibus  umbraa. 

Oceani  fontes,  et  regna  sonantia  fluctu, 
Machina  stellantis  coeli,  terraeque  cavernae 
NuUis  laxantur  mortalibus,  isque  aperiret      40 
Haec  qui  areana  poli,  magnumque  recluderet 

aequor, 
Frangeret  aeternos  nexus,  mundique  eaten  am. 
Pluriraus  (hie  error,  demensque  libido  lacessit) 
In  saperos  ecelumque  ruit,  sedesque  relinquit, 
Quas  natura  dedit  proprias,  jussitque  tueri. 
Humani  sortem  generis  pars  altera  luget, 
Invidet  armento,  et  eampi  sibi  vindicat  herbam. 
'  O  quis  me  in  pecoris  felieia  transferet  arva, 
'In  loea  pastorura  deserta,  atque  otia  dia? 
'  Cur  mihi  non  Lyncisve  oeuli,  vel  odora  eanum 

vis  50 


214  LATIN  POEMS. 

'  Additur,  aut  gressus  cursu  glomerare  potestasi 

*  Aspice,  ubi,  teneros  dum  texit  aranea  casses, 
'  Funditur  in  telam,  et  late  per  stamina  vivit  I 

*  Quid  mihi  non  tactus  eadem  exquisita  facultas, 
'  Taurorumve  tori  solidi,  pennae  volucrum. 

PertaBsos  sortis  doceant  responsa  silere. 
Si  tanto  valeas  contendere  acumine  vists, 
Et  graciles  penetrare  atomos ;  non  sethera  possis 
Suspicere,  aut  lati  spatium  comprendere  ponti. 
Yis  si  adsit  major  naris  :  quara  vane,  doleres,  60 
Extinctus  fragranti  aura,  dulcique  veneno  ! 
Si  tactus,  tremat  hoc  corpus,  solidoque  dolore 
Ardeat  in  membris,  nervoque  laboret  in  omni ; 
Sive  auris,  f ragor  exaniraet,  cum  rumpitur  igne 
Fulmineo  coelum,  totusque  admurmurat  sether  ; 
Quam  demum  humanas,    priscasque  requirere 

dotes 
Attonitus  nimium  cuperes,  nimiumque  reverti 
In  solitam  speciem,  veterique  senescere  forma. 

Nubila  seu  tentes,  vetitumque  per  aera  sur- 
gas, 
Sive  rudes  posoas  sylvas,  et  lustra  ferarum ;  70 
Falleris  ;  in  medio  solium  Sapientia  fixit. 
Desine  sectari  majora,  minorave  sorte, 
Quam  Deus,  et  rerum  attribuit  natura  creatrix. 


LATIN  POEMS.  215 


II. 

m  D :  29AM  MAIL. 

First  printed  in  Mr.  Gosse's  edition,  '  from  a  MS.  in 
the  handwriting  of  the  poet,  signed  Oray,  lately  found 
at  Pembroke  College,'  with  which  I  have  compared  it. 

Bella  per  Angliacos  plusquam  civilia  campos 
Prasteritae  videre  dies ;  desaevit  Enyo, 
Terapestasque  jacet ;  circum  vestigia  flammae 
Delentur,  pacisque  iterum  consurgit  imago ; 
Littore,  quo  nuper  Martis  fremuere  procellae, 
Alcyone  tutum  struit  imperterrita  nidum. 
Reddita  spes  solii  regno,  regemque  vagantem 
Patria  chara  tenet,  dictisque  aflFatur  amicis. 
Quas  ego  te  terras,  quot  per  discrimina  vec- 

tum 
Accipio,  quantis  jactatum,  Nate,  periclis  ?        10 
Quam  metui,  nequid  tibi  Gallica  regna  noce- 

rent, 
Belgaruraque  plages,  perjuraque  Scotia  patri ! 
Quam  tremui,  cum  laeva  tuas  Vigornia  turmas 
Fudit  praecipites,  hostemque  reraisit  ovantem ! 
Tuque,  Arbor,  nostras  felix  tutela  coronae, 


'J,U 


LATIN  POEMS. 


Gloriac  amporum,  et  luci  regina  vocare ; 
Tota  tibi  sylva  assurget,  quae  fronde  dedisti 
Securas  latebras,  nemorosa  palatia  regi  I 
Sacra   Jovi  Latio   quondam,  nunc  sacra  Bri- 

tanno. 
Olim  factus  honos,  illi  velasse  capillos,  20 

Qui  leto  civera  abripuit,  salvuraque  reduxitj 
Jam  potes  ipsa  tribus  populis  praestare  salutem. 

Gray. 


III. 
IN  5TAM  NOVEMBRIS. 

First  printed  in  Gosse's  edition,  '  from  a  MS.  in  the 
handwriting  of  the  poet,  signed  Qray,  lately  found  at 
Pembroke  College,'  with  which  I  have  compared  it. 

Lis  anceps,  multosque  diu  protracta  per  annos, 

Judice  nee  facili  dissoluenda  fuit ; 
Cui  tribuenda  modo  sceleratae  preraia  palmae  ? 

Quern  merito  tantus  nobilitaret  honos? 
Multa  sibi  Romge  ssevi  ascivere  tyranni, 

Multa  sibi  primus,  posteriorque  Nero  ; 
Qui  retulit  praedam  nostra  de  litore  Conchas 

Quern  dedit  ex  pura  Flavia  stirpe  domus: 


LATIN  POEMS.  217 

Multa  sibi  Phalaris  petiit,  Trinacria  pestis  ; 

Diraque  causa  tui,  magna  Diana,  rogi  :        10 
QuaBque  referre  mora  est,    portenta  replentia 
famae 

Invitee  annates,  crimine  nota  suo. 
At    demum     innumeris    belli     Anglia    clara 
triumphis 

Militis  ostentat  parta  tropaea  manu  ; 
Nee  satis  est,  geraina   palma  insignita  nitere 

Artibus  et  bellis,  orbis  et  esse  decus ; 
Accedat  nactae  sceleris  nisi  gloria  famae, 

Et  laudis  numeros  impleat  ilia  suae  ; 
Ex  natus  surgit  mens  aspernata  priores, 

Et  tentare  novas  ingeniosa  vias,  20 

Quae  caecis  novit  Martem  sepelire  latebris, 

Tectosque  a  visu  Solis  habere  dolos ; 
Scilicet,  ut  fallat,  non  ire  in  viscera  terrae, 

Non  dubitat  simili  clade  vel  ipse  mori. 
Jamque  incepit  opus  ;  careat  successibus,  opto  ; 

Et  vetet  inceptum  Sors,  precor,  istud  opus ; 
Nee  frustra  ;  effulget  subito  lux  aurea  caeli, 

(Aspice)  rimanti  dum  domus  atra  patet; 
Reclusamque  vides  fraudem,  letique  labores, 

Antraque  miraris  sulphure  foeta  suo ;  30 

Quod  si  venturi  haec  armamentaria  fati 


218  LATIN  POEMS. 

Panderat  baud  sacri  gratia  dia  poll ; 
Jure  scelus  se  jactaret,  procerumque  ruina 
Tantum  una  gentem  perdomuisse  manu. 

Oray. 


lY. 


This  and  the  next  three  were  first  printed  by  Mr. 
Tovey  from  the  Mitford  MSS.  The  following  has  no 
designation,  but  seems,  from  the  place  in  which  it  is 
found,  to  be  Gray's.  Compare  the  English  Poem  of 
West  on  p.  109  of  Gray  and  his  Friends.  The  Latin, 
which  may  be  West's,  is  obviously  in  the  rough. 

Gratia  magna  tuae  fraud!  quod  Pectore,  Nice, 

Non  gerit  hoc  ultra  regna  superba  Yenus : 
Respirare  licet  tandem  misero  mihi,  tandem 

Appensa  in  sacro  pariete  vincla  vides 

Numquam uror ;  liber  sum :  crede 

doloso 

Suppositus  Cineri  non  latet  ullus  amor. 
Praesto  non  ira  est,  cujus  se  celet  amictu ; 

Sera,  sed  et  rediit  vix  mibi  nota  quies. 
Nee  nomen  si  forte  tunm  prevenit  ad  aures 

Pallor  et  alternus  surgit  in  ore  rubor,  10 
Corda  nee  incerto  trepidant  salientia  pulsu 

Irrigat  aut  furtim  lacryma  f usa  genas. 


LATIN  POEMS.  219 

Non  tua  per  somnos  crebra  obversatur  imago 

Non  anirao  ante  omnes  tu  mihi  mane  redis. 
Te  loquor;  at  tener  ille  silet  sub  pectoresensus 

Nee  quod  ades  l£etor  ;  nee  quod  abes  doleo. 
Kivalem  tacitus  patior ;  securus  eburnea 

Quin  ego  colla  simul  laudo,  manusque  tuas. 
Longa  nee  indignans  refero  perjuria  :  prodis 

Obvia,  mens  certa  sede  colorque  manet.     20 
Quin  faciles  risus,  vultusque  assume  superbos ; 

Spernentem  sperno,  nee  cupio  facilem. 
Nescit    ocellorum,    ut    quondam    penetrabile 
fulgur 

Ah  !  nimium  molles  pectoris  ire  vias ; 
Nee  tarn  dulce  rubent  illi,  mea  cura,  labelli  * 

juris  ut  iramemores  imperiique  sui. 
Lsetari  possum,  possum  et  maerere  ;  sed  a  te 

gaudia  nee  veniunt,  nee  veniunt  lacrymae. 
Tecum  etiam  nimii  Soles,  et  frigora  laedunt ; 

Vere  suo  sine  te  prata  nemusque  placent.   30 
Pulchra  quidem  f  acies,  sed  non  tua  sola  videtur 

(forsitan  offendam  rusticitate  mea) 
Sed   quiddara   invenies  culpandura,   qua   mihi 
nuper 

parte  est  praecipue  visus  inesse  lepos. 


220  LATIN  POEMS. 

Cum  primftm  evulsi  fatale  ex  vulnere  telum 

Credebam,  ut  f atear,  viscera  et  ipsa  trahi ; 
Luctanti  rupere  (pudor)  suspiria  pectus, 

tinxit  et  invitas  pluriraa  gutta  genas. 
Aspera  diflBcilem  vicit  Medicina  furorem  ; 

ille  dolor  saevus,  sed  magis  asper  Amor      40 
Aucupis  insidiis,  et  arundine  capta  tenaci 

sic  multo  nisu  vincula  rupit  avis ; 
Plumarum  laceros  reparat  breve  tempus  ho- 
nores, 

nee  cadit  in  similes  cautior  inde  doles. 
Tu  taraen  usque  illam  tibi  fingis  vivere  flam- 
mam, 
Et  male  me  veteres  dissimulare  faces. 
Quod  libertatem  ostento,  fractamque  Catenam, 

tantus  et  insolitae  pacis  in  ore  sonus, 
Praeteritos  meminisse  jubet  natura  dolores  ; 

quse quisque  est  passus,  dulce  pericla  loqui.    50 
Enumerat  miles  sua  vulnera  ;  navita  ventos 

Narrat  et  incautse  saxa  inimica  rati. 
Sic  ego  servitium  durum,  et  tua  regna,  laborant 

Nice,  nullam  a  te  quaerere  dicta  fidem ; 
Nil  nimium   base   mandata   student  tibi  velle 
placere. 

Nee  rogito  quali  perlegis  ore  notas. 


LATIK  POEMS.  221 


V. 

After  some  Alcaics  signed  '  Antrobiis '  comes  this 
translation  of  part  of  Philips '  Splendid  Shilling,  to 
which  Mitford  does  not  assign  the  authorship. 

Oh  !  nimium  felix  !  cura  et  discordibus  armis 
Cui  procul  exigua  non  deficiente  Crumena 
Splendet   adhuc    Solidus.     Non  ilium  torquet 

egentem 
Ostriferi  Cantus,  non  allae  *  dlra  Cupido. 
lUe  inter  Socios  gelido  sub  vespere  notum 
Tendit  iter,  genialis  ubi  se  Curia  pandit 
Juniperive  Lares  f  ;  liic  Nympham,  si  qua  pro- 

tervo 
Lumine  pertentat  Sensus,  uritque  videndo 
(Sive  Chloe,  seu  Phillis  araanti  gratior  audit) 
Alternis  recolit  cyathis,  tibi,  virgo,  salutem  10 
Lsetitiaraque  optans,  et  amoris  mutua  vincla 
Nee  minus  interea  fumique  jocique  benignus 
Non  lateri  parcit,  si  quando  argutior  alter 

*  Explained  by  reference  to  the  original — 

.  .  .  "he  nor  hears  with  pain 
New  oysters  cried,  nor  sighs  for  cheerful  ale." 

t  "To  Juniper's  Magpie  or  Town-hall  repairs."  Two 
ale-houses  at  Oxford. 


22— G  &  G— X 


222  LATIN  POEMS. 

Fabellam  orditur  lepidam,  vel  Scommata  spar- 
git 
Ambiguosve  Sales,  festiva  Crepundia  vocum. 
*  *  *  * 


VI. 

"  The  following  poem  is  written  with  ink  by  Mason 
over  Gray's  pencil, which  was  very  faint,  in  order  appar- 
ently to  preserve  it.  N,  B. — Gray's  writing  perceptible 
below  the  ink  letters." — Mitford. 

Vah,  tenero  quodcunque  potest  obsistere  amori 

Exulet  ex  animo  et  Delia  caro  meo 
Ne  timor  infelix,  mala  ne  fastidia  sancti 

Gaudia  distiueant,  Delia  cara,  tori. 
Quid  si  nulla  olim  regalia  munera  nostras 

Ornarunt  titulis  divitiisque  domos  ? 
At  nobis  proprioque  et  honesto  lumine  claris 

Ex  naeritis  ortum  nobile  nomen  erit. 
Dum  tanto  colimus  virtutem  ardore  volabit 

Gloria  dulce  sonans  nostra  per  ora  virum.  10 
Interea  nostram  mirata  Superbia  famam 

Talis  splendoris  tantum  habuisse  gemet 
Quid  si  Diva  potens  nummorum  divitis  auri 

Haud  largo  nostras  proluit  imbre  Lares? 


LATIN  POEMS.  223 

At  nobis  erit  ex  humili  bona  copia  sensu 

Vitaque  non  luxu  splendid  a,  laeta  tauien 
Sic  boras  per   quisque  suas  revolubilis  annus 

Nostra  quod  explerit  vota  precesque  dabit 
Nam  duce  natura  peragemus,  Delia,  vitam 

Yita  ea  vitalis  dicier  una  potest.  20 

Et  juvenes  et  amore  senes  florebimus  aequo 

Et  vitae  una  alacres  conficiemus  iter, 
Nostros  interea  ornabit  pax  alma  Penates 

Jucundum  Pueri  pignora  cara  torum. 
Oh  quanta  aspicerem  lepidam  dulcedine  gentem 

Luderet  ad  patrium  dum  pia  turba  genu, 
Maternos  vultu  ridenti  effingere  vultus 

Balbo  maternos  ore  referre  sonos. 
Jamque  senescentes  cum  nos  insederit  aetas 

Nostraque  se  credat  surripuisse  bona,         30 
In  vestris  tu  rursus  amabere  pulchra  puellis 

Kursus  ego  in  pueris  Delia  amabo  meis. 

The  above  is  a  free  translation  of  the  song,  "  Away, 
let  nought  to  Love  displeasing,"  which  first  appeared 
in  1726. 

We  may  conjecture  that  it  is  an  early  effort.  Noth- 
ing but  immaturity  can  account  for  some  peculiari- 
ties in  it ;  '  vestris,'  for  example,  in  the  last  line  but 
one.— Tovey. 


224 


LATIN  POEMS. 


YII. 

PAEAPHRASE  OF  PSALM  LXXXIY. 

O  Tecta,  Mentis  dulcis  amor  meae ! 
Oh  !  summa  Sancti  Religio  loci 
Quae  me  laborantem  perurit 
Sacra  fames,  et  amicus  ardor  ? 

Praeceps  volentem  quo  rapit  impetus ! 
Ad  limen  altum  tendo  avidas  manus 
Dum  lingua  frustratur  precantem 
Cor  taciturn  mihi  clamat  intus. 

lUic  loquacem  composuit  doraum 
Laresque  parvos  Nurainis  in  fidem  10 

Praesentioris  credit  ales 
Veris  amans,  vetus  Hospes  arae  : 

Beatus  ales  !  sed  raagis  incola 
Quem  vidit  aedes  ante  focos  [Dei*] 
Cultu  ministrantem  perenni 
Quique  sacra  requievit  umbra. 

In  the  Mitford  MS.  '  focos '  is  partly  struck  out,  ancj 
the  line  ends  incomplete. 


LATIN  POEMS.  225 

Bis  terque  felix  qui  melius  Deo 
Templum  sub  imo  Pectore  consecrat 
Huic  vivida  affulget  voluptas 

Et  liquidi  sine  nube  Soles.  20 

Integriori  fonte  fluentia 
Mentem  piorum  gaudia  recreant, 
Quod  si  datur  lugere,  quiddam 
Dulce  ferens  ?enit  ipse  luctus. 

Virtute  virtus  firmior  evenit 
Nascente  semper,  semper  amabili 
Sterna  crescit,  seque  in  horas 
Subjiciet  per  aperta  caeli 

Me,  dedicatum  qui  Genus,  et  tuae 
Judaeae  habenas  tempero,  Regio  30 

Madens  olivo,  dexter  audi 
Nee  libeat  repulisse  Regem. 

Lux  una  Sanctis  quse  foribus  dedit 
Hserere,  amatae  limine  Januae, 
Lux  inter  extremas  Columnas 
Candidius  mihi  ridet  una, 

Quam  Seculorum  Secula  Barbaros 
Inter  Penates  sub  trabe  geramea 
Fastus  tyrannorum  brevesque 

Delicias  et  amoena  Regni ;  40 


226  LATIN  POEMS. 

Feliciori  flumine  Copiam 
Pronaque  dextra  Caelicolum  Pater 
Elargietur,  porrigetque 
Divitias  diuturniores. 

The  above  ode  is  written  in  Gray's  hand ;  but  evi- 
dently when  young,  the  hand  being  unformed  and  like 
a  schoolboy's,  though  very  plain  and  careful.  The  leaf 
on  which  it  is  written,  apparently  torn  from  a  copy- 
book. .  .  .  Some  of  the  expressions  resemble  those  in 
the  Grande  Chartreuse  Ode.— Mitford, 


YIII. 
HYMENEAL 

ON  THE  MAERIAGE  OF  H.R.H.  THE  PRINCE  OF 
WALES,  1736. 

Printed  in  the  Oratulatio  Academice  Cantdbrigien- 
sis  Auspicatissimas  Frederiei  Wallice  Principis  et  Au' 
gustce  Principissce  Saxo-Gothce  Nuptias  celedrantis. — 
Cantab  :  Typis  Acad.  fol.  1736. 

First  published  among  Gray's  Poems,  in  S.  Jones' 
edition,  1799. 

Ignar^  nostrum  mentes,  et  inertia  corda, 
Dum  curas  regum,  et  Sortem  miseramur  ini- 

quam, 
Quae  Solio  a.ffixit,  vetuitque  calescere  flamma 


I 


HYMENEAL.  227 

Dulci,  quae  dono  Divum,  gratissima  serpit 
Viscera  per,  mollesque    animis    lene   implicat 

aestus ; 
Nee  teneros  sensus,  Veneris  nee  praemia  norunt, 
Eloquiumve  oculi,  aut  facunda  silentia  linguae  : 
Scilicet  ignorant  lacryraas,  ssevosque  dolores, 
Dura  rudimenta,  et  violentae  exordia  Hammae  ; 
Scilicet  ignorant,  quae  flumine  tinxit  amaro  10 
Tela  Vemis,  caecique  armamentaria  Divi, 
Irasque,  insidiasque,   et   tacitum   sub   pectore 

vulnus ; 
Namque    sub    ingressu,    primoque    in    limine 

Amoris 
Luctus  et  ultrices  posuere  cubilia  Curae ; 
Intus  habent  dulces  Risus,  et  Gratia  sedem, 
Et  roseis  resupina  toris,  roseo  ore  Voluptas : 
Regibus  hue  f aciles  aditus  ;  comraunia  spernunt 
Ostia,  jamque  expers  duris  custodibus  istis 
Panditur  accessus,  penetralisque  intima  Templi. 

Tuque  Oh  !  Angliacis.  Princeps,  spes  optima 
regnis,  20 

Ne  tantum,  ne  finge  metum :  quid  imagine 
captus 

Haeres,  et  mentum  pictura  pascis  inani  ? 


228  LATIN  POEMS. 

Umbram  miraris :  nee  longum  tempus,  et  Ipsa 
Ibit  in  amplexiis,  thalamosque  ornabit  ovantes. 
lUe    tamen    tabulis    inhians    longum     haurit 

amorem, 
Affatu  fruitur  tacito,  auseultatque  taeentem 
Immemor    artificis    calami,    risumque,     rubo- 

remque 
Aspicit  in  fucis,  pietaeque  in  virginis  ore : 
Tanta  Venus  potuit ;  tantus  tenet  error  aman- 

tes. 

Kascere.,  magna  Dies,  qua  sese  Augusta  Bri- 

tanno 
Committat  Pelago,  patriamque  relinquat  amoe- 

nam  ; 
Cujus  in  adventum  jam   nunc  tria   regna   se- 

cundos 
AttoUi  in  plausus,  dulcique  accensa  furore 
Incipiunt  agitare  modos,  et  carmina  dicunt : 
Ipse  anirao  sedenim  juvenis  comitatur  euntem 
Explorat  ventos,  atque  auribus  aera  captat, 
Atque  auras,  atque  astra  vocat  crudelia  ;  pectus 
Intentum  exultat,  surgitque  arrecta  cupido ; 
Incusat  spes  aegra  fretum,  solitoque  videtur 
Latior  elTundi  pontus,  fluctusque  morantes.  40 


HYMENEAL.  229 

Nascere,  Lux  major,  qua  sese  Augusta  Bri- 

tanno 
Committat  juveni  totam,  propriamque  dicabit ; 
At  citius  (precor)  Oh  !  cedas  melioribus  astris  ; 
]^ox  finem  pompse,  finemque  imponere  curis 
Possit,  et  in  thalamos  f  urtim  deducere  nuptam  ; 
Sufficiat  requiemque   viris,   et   amantibus   um 

bras  : 
Adsit  Hymen,  et  subridens  cum  matre  Cupido 
Accedant,  sternantque  toros,  ignemque   mini% 

strent ; 
Ilicet  baud  pictae  incandescit  imagine  formse 
Ulterius  juvenis,  verumque  agnoscit  amorem.  50 

Sculptile  sicut  ebur,  faciemque  arsisse  venus- 

tam, 
Pygmaliona  canunt :  ante  banc  suspiria  ducit, 
Alloqiiiturque  amens,  flammamque  et  vulnera 

narrat ; 
Implorata  Ve7ius  jussit  cum  vivere  signura, 
Foemineam    inspirans   animam ;   quae    gaudia 

surgunt, 
Audiit  ut  priraaB  nascentia  murmura  linguaB, 
Luctari  in  vitam,  et'paulatim  volvere  ocellos 
beduius,  aspexitquenovasplendescere  flamma; 


230 


LATIN  POEMS. 


Corripit  amplexu  vivam,  jamque  oscula  jungit 
Acria  confestim,  recipitque  rapitque  ;  prioris  60 
Immemor  ardoris,  Nymphseque  oblitus  eburneae. 


IX. 

LUNA  HABITABILIS. 

First  published,  without  Gray's  name,  in  Musce 
Etonenses,  ii.  107.  In  a  letter  to  West,  dated  March, 
1737,  he  says :  '*  My  College  has  set  me  a  versifying  on 
a  public  occasion  (viz.,  those  verses  which  are  called 
tripos)  on  the  theme  of  '  Luna  esthabitabiUs." 

Dtjm  Nox  rorantes,  non  incomitata  per  auras 
TJrget  equos,  tacitoque  inducit  sidera  lapsu  ; 
Ultima,  sed  nuUi  soror  inficianda  sororum, 
Hue  mihi,  Musa ;  tibi  patet  alti  janua  coeli, 
Astra  vides,  nee  te  numeri,  nee  nomina  fallunt. 
Hue   mihi,   Diva  veni;  dulee  est  per  aperta 

serena 
Yere  frui  liquido,  campoque  errare  silenti ; 
Yere  frui  dulee  est ;  modo  tu  dignata  petentem 
Sis  comes,  et  meeum  gelida  spatiere  sub  umbra. 
Scilicet  hos  orbes,  coeli  haee  decora  alta  putan. 

dum  est, 
Noetis  opes,  nobis   tantum  lueere ;  virumque 


LUNA  HABITABILIS.  231 

Ostentari  oculis,  nostrse  laquearia  terrae, 
Ingentas  scenas,  vastique  aulaea  theatri  ? 
Oh  !  quis  me  pennis  gethrse  super  ardua  sistet 
Mirantem,  propiusque  dabit  convexa  tueri ; 
Teque  adeo,  unde  fluens  reficit  lux  mollior  arva 
Pallidiorque  dies,  tristes  solata  tenebras  ? 

Sic  ego,  subridens  Dea  sic  ingressa  vicissim : 
Non  pennis   opus  hie,   supera   ut    simul   ilia 

petamus : 
Disce,  Puer,  potius  ccelo  deducere  Lunam  ;  20 
Neu  crede  ad  magicas  te  invitum  accingier  artes, 
Thessalicosve  modos ;  ipsara  descendere  Phoe- 

ben 
Conspicies  novus  Endymion  ;  seque  ofiPeret  ultro 
Yisa  tibi  ante  oculos,  et  nota  major  imago. 
Quin  tete  admoveas  (tumuli   super  aggere 

spectas), 
Compositum  tubulo ;  simul  imum  invade  cana- 

lem 
Sic  intenta  acie,  coeli  simul  alta  patescent 
Atria  ;  jamque,  ausus  Lunaria  visere  regna, 
Ingrediere  solo,  et  caput  inter  nubila  condes. 

Ecce  autem !  vitri  se  in  vertice  sistere  Phoeben 
Cernis,  et  Oceanum,  et  crebis   Freta  consita 

terris 


232  LATIN  POEMS. 

Panditur  ille  atram  faciem  caligine  condens 
Sublustri ;  refugitque  oculos,  fallitque  tuentem ; 
Integram  Solis  lucem  quippe  haurit  aperto 
Flucfcu  avidus    radiorum,    et    longos  imbibit 

ignes  : 
Verum  his,  quae,  maculis   variata  nitentibus, 

auro 
Coerula  discernunt,  celso  sese  insula  dorso 
Plurima  protrudit,  praetentaque  littora  saxis ; 
Liberior  datur  his  quoniani  natura,  minusque 
Lumen   depascunt  liquidum  ;  sed  tela  diei     40 
Detorquent,  retroque  decent  se  vertere  flam- 
mas. 
Hinc  longos  videas  tractus,  terrasque  jacentes 
Ordine  candenti,  et  claros  se  attollere  montes  ; 
Montes  quels  Rhodope  assurgat,  quibus  Ossa 

nivali 
Vertice  :  turn  scopulis  infra  pendentibus  antra 
Nigrescunt  clivorum  umbra,   nemorumque  te- 

nebris. 
Non  rores  illi,  aut  desunt  sua  nubila  mundo ; 
Non  frigus  gelidum,  atque  her  bis  gratissimus 

imber ; 
His  quoque  nota  ardet  picto  Thaumantias  arcu, 
Os  roseum  Aurorae,  propriique  crepuscula  coeli. 


LUNA  HABITABILIS.  233 

Et  dubitas  tantum  certis  cultoribus  orbem  61 
Destitui  ?  exercent  agros,  sua  moenia  condunt 
Hi  quoque,  vel  Martem  invadunt,   curantque 

triumphos 
Yictores:   sunt  hie  etiam  sua  prgemia  laudi; 
His  metus,  atque  amor,  et  aientem  inortalia 

tangunt 
Quin,  uti  nos  oculis  jam  nunc  juvat  ire  perarva, 
Lucentesque  plagas  Lunae,  pontumque  profun- 

dum  ; 
Idem  illos  etiam  ardor  agit,  cum  se  aureus  effert 
Sub  sudum  globus,  et  terrarum  ingentior  orbis ; 
Scilicet   omne   sequor    turn   lustrant,    scilicet 

omnem  60 

Tellurem,     gentesque    polo    sub  utroque  Ja- 

centes ; 
Et  quidam  aestivi  indefessus  ad  jetheris  ignes 
Pervigilat,  noctem  exercens,  ccelumque  fatigat ; 
Jam  Galli  apparent,  jam  se  Germania  late 
ToUit,  et  albescens  pater  Apenninus  ad  auras  ; 
Jam  tandem  in  Borean,  en !  parvulus  Anglia 

naevus 
(Quanquara  aliis  longe  fulgentior)  extulit  oras  ; 
Formosum  extempld  lumen,  maculamque  ni- 

tentem 


234:  LATIN  POEMS. 

Invisunt  crebri  Proceres,  serum  que  tuendo  ; 
Haerent,  certatimque  suo  cognomine  signant :  70 
Forsitan  et  Lunae  longinquus  in  orbe  Tyrannus 
Se  dominum  vocat,  et  nostra  se  jactat  in  aula. 
Terras  possim  alias  propiori  sole  calentes 
Narrare,  atque  alias,  jubaris  queis  parcior  usus, 
Lunarum  chorus,  et  tenuis  penuria  Phoebi ; 
Ni,  meditans  eadam  hgec  audaci  evolvere  cantu, 
Jam  pulset  citharam  soror,  er  praeludia  tentet. 
Non  tamen  has   proprias   laudes,  nee   facta 
silebo 
Jampridem  in  fatis,  patriaeque  oracula  famse. 
Tempus  erit,  sursum  totos  contendere  castus  80 
Quo  cernes  longo  excursu,  primosque  colonos 
Migrare  in  lunam,  et  notos  rautare  Penates : 
Dum  stupet  obtutu   tacito  vetus   incola,  lon- 

geque 
Insolitas  explorat  aves,  classemque  volantem. 
Ut   quondam   ignotum  marmor,  camposque 
natantes 
Tranavit   Zephyros   visens,   nova   regna,    Co- 
lumbus ; 
Litora  mirantur  circum,  mirantur  et  undaD 
Inclusas  acies  ferro,  turmasque  biformes,        88 
Monstraque  foeta  armis,  et  non  imitabile  f  ulmen. 


SAPPHIC  ODE.  235 

Foedera  mox  iota,  et  gemini  commercia  mundi, 
Agminaque  assueto  glomerata  sub  aethere  cerno. 
Anglia,  quge  pelagi  jamdudum  torquet  habenas, 
Exercetque  frequens  ventos,  atque  imprat 
undae ; 
Aeris  attollet  fasces,  veteresque  triumphos 
Hue  etiam  feret,  et  victis  dominabitur  auris. 


X. 

AD  C.  FAYONIUM  ARISTIUM  * 

SAPPHIC  ODE. 

Barbaras  aedes  aditure  mecum, 
Quas  Eris  semper  fovet  inquieta, 
Lis  ubi  late  sonat,  et  togatuni 

^stuat  agmen ! 

Dulcius  quanto,  patulis  sub  ulmi 
Hospitae  ramis  temere  jacentem 
Sic  libris  horas,  tenuique  inertes 

Eallero  Musa ! 

*  This  is  Gray's  heading  in  his  Commonplace   Book. 
The  Ode  forms  part  of  a  letter  to  West  in  June,  1738. 


236  LATIN  POEWS. 

Saepe  enim  curis  vagor  expedita 

Mente ;  dura,  blandam  meditans  Camgenam, 

Vix  malo  rori,  meminive  serae 

Cedere  nocti ; 
Et,  pedes  quo  me  rapiunt,  in  omni 
CoUe  Parnassum  videor  videre 
Fertilem  sylvae,  geldamque  in  omni 

Fonte  Aganippen. 

Risit  et  Ver  me,  facilesque  Nymphae 
Nare  captantem,  nee  ineleganti, 
Mane  quicquid  de  violis  eundo 

Surripit  aura :  20 

Me  reclinatum  teneram  per  herbam ; 
Qua  leves  cursus  aqua  cunque  ducit, 
Et  moras  dulci  strepitu  lapillo 

Nectit  in  omni. 
Hae  novo  nostrum  fere  pectus  anno 
Simplices  curaB  tenuere,  coelura 
Qamdi  sudum  explicuit  Favoni 

Purior  hora : 
Otia  et  campos  nee  adhuc  relinquo, 
Nee  magis  Phoebo  Clytia  fidelis ;  30 

(Ingruant  venti  licet,  et  senescat 

Mollior  £estas.) 


SAPPHIC  ODE.  237 

Namque,  seu,  laetos  hominura  labores 
Prataque  et  montes  recreante  curru, 

Purpura  tractus  oriens  Eoos 

Vestit,  et  auro ; 

Sedulus  servo,  veneratus  orbem 
Prodigum  splendoris :  amoeniori 
Sive  dilectam  meditatur  igne 

Pingere  Calpen ; 

Usque  dum,  fulgore  magis  magis  jam 
Languido  circura,  variata  nubes 
Labitur  furtim,  viridisque  in  umbras 

Scena  recessit. 

O  ego  felix,  vice  si  (nee  unquam 
Surgerem  rursus)  siraili  cadentem 
Parca  me  lenis  sineret  quieto 

Fallere  letho ! 


Multa  flagranti  radiisque  cincto 
Integris  ah !  quam  nihil  inviderera, 
Cum  Dei  ardentes  medius  quadrigas 

Sentit  Olympus? 

Cambridge,  June,  1738. 


50 


238  LATIN  POEMS. 

XI. 

ALCAIC  FRAGMENT. 

Ten  lines  of  Latin  prose  followed  the  above  ode, 
and  then  this  stanza.  West  returned  him  '  a  thou- 
sand thanks  for  his  elegant  ode  and  little  Alcaic 
fragment.' 

O  LACRYMAKDM  Fons,  tenero  sacros 
Ducentium  ortus  ex  animo ;  quater 
Felix !  in  irao  qui  scatentem 
Pectore  te,  pia  Nympha,  sensit ! 


XII. 
SAPPHICS. 

To  Richard  West  from  Genoa,  31st  November,  1739. 

HoRRiDos  tractus,  Boregeque  linquens 
Regna  Taurini  fera,  molliorem 
Advehor  brumam,  Genuseque  amantes 

Litora  soles. 


LATIN  POEMS.  239 

XIII. 
ELEGIACS. 

On  a  visit  to  the  site  of  the  Battle  of  Trebia,  in  a 
letter  to  West  from  Florence,  on  the  15th  of  January, 
1740. 

Qua  Treble  glaucas  salices  intersecat  unda, 
Arvaque  Romanis  nobilitate  mails, 

Ylsus  adhuc  amnls  veterl  de  clade  rubere, 
Et  susplrantes  ducere  raoestus  aquas, 

Maurorumque  ala,  et  nigrae  increbescere  turmae, 
Et  pulsa  Ausonldum  rlpa  sonare  fuga. 


XIV. 
AD  C.  FAVONIUM  ZEPHYRINUM. 

Sent  to  Richard  West  from  Rome,  in  May,  1740. 

In  the  copy  in  Gray's  handwriting  in  the  Pembroke 
MBS.  ,  he  has  appended  this  note  :— "  Wrote  at  Rome, 
the  latter  end  the  of  spring  1740,  after  a  journey  to 
Frascatiand  the  cascades  of  Tivoli." 

Matter  rosarum,  cul  tenerae  vigent 
Auraa  Favonl,  cul  Venus  It  comes 
Lasciva,  Nympharura  choreis 
Et  volucrum  celebrata  cantu  I 


240  LATIN  POEMS. 

Die,  non  inertem  fallere  qua  diem 
Amat  sub  umbra,  seu  sinit  aureum 
Dormire  plectrum,  seu  retentat 
Pierio  Zephyrinus  antro 
Furore  dulci  plenus,  et  immemor 
Keptantis  inter  frigora  Tusculi  10 

TJmbrosa,  vel  colles  amici 
Palladise  superantis  Albse. 
Dilecta  Fauno,  et  capripedum  choris 
Pineta,  testor  vos,  Anio  minax 
Quaecunque  per  clivos  volutus 
Prsecipiti  tremefecit  amne, 
Illius  altum  Tibur,  et  ^sulaa 
Audisse  sylvas  nomen  amabiles, 
Illius  et  gratas  Latinis 
Naiasin  ingeminasse  rupes ;  20 

Nam  me  Latinae  Naiades  uvida 
Videre  ripa,  qua  niveas  levi 
Tam  saepe  lavit  rore  plumas 
Dulce  canens  Venusinus  ales ; 
Mirum !  canenti  conticuit  nemus, 
Sacrique  fontes,  et  retinet  adhuc 
(Sic  Musa  jussit)  saxa  moUes 
Docta  modos,  veteresque  lauri. 
Mirare  nee  tu  me  citharae  rudem 


LATIN  POEMS.  241 

Claudis  laborantem  numeris  :  loca  30 

Amoena,  jucundumque  ver  in- 

compositum  docuere  carmen ; 
Haerent  sub  omni  nam  folio  nigri 
Phoebea  luci  (credite)  somnia, 

Argutiusque  et  lympha  et  auraa 
Nescio  quid  solito  loquuntur. 


XV. 


FRAGMENT  OF  A  LATIN  POEM  ON  THE 

GAURUS. 

Sent  to  Richard  West  from  Florence,  in  a  letter  dated 
September  25,  1740, 

In  the  copy  in  Gray's  handwriting  in  the  Pembroke 
MSS.,  he  has  appended  this  note  : — "  Rome,  July  1740  ; 
just  returned  from  Naples." 

*  *  *  * 

Nec  procul  infelix  se  toUit  in  sethera  Gaurus 
Prospiciens  vitreum  lugenti  vertice  pontum : 
Tristior  ille  diu,  et  veteri  desuetus  oliva 
Gaurus,  pampineaeque    eheu  jam    nescius  um- 
brae ; 
Ilorrendi  tarn  saeva  premit  vicinia  mentis, 
Attonitumque  urget  latus,  exuritque  ferentem. 


242  LATIN  POEMS. 

Nam  fama  est  olim,  media  dum  rura  silebant 
Nocte,  Deo  victa,  et  raoUi  perfusa  quiete, 
Infremuisse  aequor  ponti,  auditamque  per  omnes 
Late  tellurem  surdum  immugire  cavernas :     10 
Quo  sonitu  nemora  alta  tremunt :  tremit  excita 

tuto 
Parthenopaea  sinu,  flammanti  que  ora  Yesevi. 
At  subito  se  aperire  solum,  vastosque  recessus 
Pandere  sub  pedibus,  nigraque  voragine  fauces  ; 
Tum  piceas  cinerum  glomerare  sub  aethere  nubes 
Vorticibus  rapidis,  ardentique  imbre  procellam. 
Praecipites  fugere  ferae,  perque  avia  longe 
Sil varum  fugit  pastor,  juga  per  deserta, 
Ah,   miser!   increpitans  saepe    alta  voce    per 

umbram  19 

Nequicquam  natos,  creditque  audire  sequentes. 
Atque  ille  excelso  rupis  de  vertice  solus 
Respectans  notasque  domos,  et  dulcia  regna, 
Nil  usquam  videt   infelix  praeter  mare  tristi 
Lumine  percussum,  et  pallentes  sulphure  cam- 

pos 
Fumumque,    flammasque,    rotataque    turbine 

saxa> 
Quin  ubi  detonuit  fragor,  et  lux  reddita  caelo ; 
Maestos  confluere  agricolas,  passuque  videres 


LATIN  POEMS.  243 

(Tandem  iterura  timido  deserta  requirere  tecta : 
Sperantes,  si  forte  oculis,  si  forte  darentur 
Uxorum  cineres,  miserorumve  ossa  parentum  30 
(Tenuia,  sed  tanti  saltern  solatia  luctus) 
Una  colligere  et  justa  componere  in  urna. 
Uxorum  nusquam  cineres,  nusquam  ossa  paren- 
tum 
(Spem   raiseram ! )  assuetosve  Lares,  aut  rura 

videbunt. 
Quippe  ubi  planities  campi  diffusa  jacebat ; 
Mons  novus :  ille  supercilium,  frontemque  fa  villa 
Incanum  ostentans,  ambustis  cautibus,  sequor 
Subjectum,   stragemque    suam,    maesta    arva, 

minaci 
Despicit  imperio,  soloque  in  littore  regnat. 
Hinc  in  fame  loci  nomen,  multosque  per  an- 
nos  40 

Immemor  antiquae  laudis,  nescire  labores 
Yomeris,  et  nullo  tellus  revirescere  cultu. 
Non  avium  colles,  non  carmine  matutino 
Pastorum  resonare  ;  adeo  undique  dirus  habebat 
Informes  late  horror  agros  saltusque  vacantes. 
Sa^pius  et  longe  detorquens  navita  proram 
Monstrabat  digito  littus,  saevaeque  revolvens 
Funera  uarrabat  noctis,  veteremque  ruinam. 


244  LATIN  POEMS. 

Montis  adhuc  facies  manet  hirta  atque  as- 

pera  saxis  : 
Sed   furor    extinctus   jamdudum,    et    flamma 

quievit,  50 

Quae  nascenti  aderat ;  seu  fortd  bituminis  atri 
Defluxere  olim  rivi,  atque  effoeta  lacuna 
Pabula  sufficere  ardori,  viresque  recusat ; 
Sive  in  visceribus  meditans  incendia  jam  nunc 
(Horrendum)   arcanis   glomerat    genti   esse 

futurae 
Exitio,  sparsos  tacitusque  recolligit  ignes. 
Raro  per  clivos  baud  secius  ordine  vidi 
Canescentem  oleam :  longum  post  tempus  amicti 
Vite  virent  tumuli^;  patriamque  revisere  gau- 

dens  59 

Bacchus  in  assuetis  tenerura  caput  exerit  arvis 
Vix  tandem,  infidoque  audet  se  credere  coelo. 


XVI. 
A  FAREWELL  TO  FLORENCE. 

In  a  letter  to  West,  from  Florence,  April  21,  1741. 

.  .  Oh  FaeulaB  amoena 
Frigoribus  juga,  nee  nimium  spirantibus  auris  I 


LATIN  POEMS.  245 

Alma  quibus  Tusci  Pallas  decus  Apennini 
Esse  dedit,  glaucaque  sua  canescere  sylva ! 
Non  ego  vos  posthac  Arni  de  valle  videbo 
Porticibus  circum,  et  candenti  cincta  corona 
Yillarum  longe  nitido  consurgere  dorso, 
Antiquamve   ^dem,  et  veteres  praeferre  Cu- 

pressus 
Mirabor,  tectisque  super  pendentia  tecta. 


XVII. 
IMITATION  OF  AN  ITALIAN  SONNET  * 

OF  SIGNIOK    ABBATE    BUONDELMONTE. 
In  the  same  letter  as  the  foregoing. 

LusiT  amicltiae  interdum  velatus  amictu, 
Et  bene  composita  veste  fefellit  Amor. 
Mox  irsB  assumpsit  cultus,  faciemque  mman» 
tern, 

*  Spesso  Amor  sotto  la  forma 
D'amista  ride,  e  s'asconde  : 
Poi  si  mischia,  e  si  confonde 
Con  lo  sdegno,  e  col  rancor. 
In  Pietade  ei  si  trasforma  ; 
Par  trastullo,  e  par  dispetto; 
Ma  nel  suo  diverso  aspotto 
Sempr'  egli,  4  V  istesso  Amor. 


22— G  &  d—Y 


246  LATIN  POEMS. 

Inque  odium  versus,  versus  et  in  lacrymas : 
Ludentem    fuge,    nee    lacrymanti,    aut   credo 
furenti ; 
Idem  est  dissimili  semper  in  ore  Deus. 

XYIII. 
ALCAIC  ODE. 

Written  in  the  album  of  the  Grande  Chartreuse,  in 
Dauphiny,  August,  1741,     The  original,  which  was 
much  valued  by  the  monks,  was  destroyed  during  the 
French  Revolution  by  a  mob  from  Grenoble. 

The   heading  to  this  in   the    Pembroke  MSS.  is  :— 
"  In  the  Book  at  the  Grande  Chartreuse  among  the 
Mountains  of  Daui^hine." 

Oh  Tu,  severi  Religio  loci, 
Quocunque  gaudes  nomine  (non  leve 
Nativa  nam  certe  fluenta 

Numen  habet,  veteresque  sylvas  ; 
Praesentiorem  et  conspicimus  Deum 
Per  invias  rupes,  fera  per  juga, 
Clivosque  prgeruptos,  sonantes 
Inter  aquas,  nemorumque  noctem ; 
Quam  si  repostus  sub  trabe  citrea 
Fulgeret  auro,  et  Phidiaca  manu)  10 

Salve  vocanti  rite,  fesso  et 
Da  placidam  juveni  quietem. 


SOPHONISBA  AD  MASINISSAM.  247 

Quod  si  invidendis  sedibus,  et  frui 
Fortima  sacra  lege  silentii 

Yetat  volentem,  me  resorbens 
In  medios  violenta  fluctus : 
Saltern  remoto  des,  Pater,  angulo 
Horas  senectse  ducere  liberas ; 

Tutumque  vulgari  tumultii 

Surripias,  hominumque  curis.  20 

August,  1741. 


XIX. 
SOPHONISBA  AD  MASINISSAM. 

Egeegium  accipio  promissi  Munus  amoris, 

Inque  manu  mortem,  jam  fruitura,  fero  : 
Atque  utinam  citius  mandasses,  luce  vel  una; 

Transieram  Stygios  non  inhonesta  lacus. 
Victoris  nee  passa  toros,  nova  nupta,  mariti, 

Nee  fueram  fastus,  Roma  Superba,  tuos. 
Scilicet  h£ec  partem  tibi,  Masinissa,  triumph! 

Detractara,  liaec  pompae  jura  minora  suae 
Imputat,  atque  uxor  quod   non    tua   pressa- 
catenis, 

Objecta  et  s£evae  plausibus  orbis  eo  :  10 


248  LATIN  POEMS. 

Quin  tu  pro  tantis  cepisti  praemia  factis, 

Magnum  Roraanae  pignus  amicitiaD  ! 
Scipiadae  excuses,  oro,  si,  tardius  utar 

Munere.     Non  nimiura  vivere,  crede,  velira. 
Parva  mora  est,  breve  sed  tempus  mea  fama 
requirit : 

Detinet  haec  animam  cura  supreraa  meam. 
Quae   patriae  prodesse  meae  Regina  ferebar, 

Inter  Elisasas  gloria  prima  nurus, 
Ne  videar  flammae  nimis  indulsisse  secundae, 

Vel  nimis  hostiles  extimuisse  manus.  20 

Fortunam  atque  annos  liceat  revocare  priores, 

Gaudiaque     lieu !     quantis     nostra  repensa 
malis. 
Primitiasne  tuas  meministi  atque  arma  Syphacis 

Fusa,  et  per  Tyrias  ducta  trophaea  vias  ? 
(Laudis  at  antiquse   forsan  meminisse  pigebit, 

Quodque  decus  quondam  causa  ruboris  erit.) 
Tempus  ego  certe  memini,  felicia  Poenis 

Quo  te  non  puduit  solvere  vota  deis ; 
Maeniaque  intrantem  vidi :  longo  agmine  duxit 

Turba  salutantum,  purpureique  patres.       30 
Foeminea  ante  omnes  longe  adrairatur  euntem 

Ilaeret  et  aspectu  tota  caterva  tuo. 
Jam  flexi,  regale  decus,  per  col  la  capiJli, 


SOPHONISBA  AD  MASINISSAM.  249 

Jam  decet  ardenti  fuscus  in  ore  color ! 
Commendat  frontis  generosa  modesti  a  f ormam, 

Seque  cupit  laudi  surripuisse  suae. 
Prima  genas  tenui  signat  vix  flore  juventas, 

Et  dextrae  soli  credimus  esse  virum. 
Dum  faciles  gradiens  oculos  per  singula  jactas, 

(Seu  rexit  casus  lumina,  sive  Yenus)  40 

In  me  (vel  certe  visum  est)  conversa  morari 

Sensi ;  virgineus  perculit  ora  pudor. 
!Nescio  quid  vultum  molle  spirare  tuendo, 

Credideramque  tuos  lentius  ire  pedes. 
Quaerebam,  juxta  aequalis  si  dignior  esset, 

Quaa  poterat  visus  detinuisse  tuos : 
Nulla  fuit  circum  aequalis  quae  dignior   esset, 

Asseruitque  decus  conscia  forma  suum. 
Pompae  finis  erat.     Tota  vix  nocte  quievi, 

Sin  premat  invitae  lumina  victa  sopor,         50 
Somnus    habet    pompas,     eademque   recursat 


imago  ; 


Atque  iterum  hesterno  numere  victor  ades. 
*        *  *        *  *         *        * 


250  LATIN  POEMa 

XX. 

DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI. 

LIBER    PRIMUS.       AD    FAVONIUM. 

The  first  couple  of  hundred  lines  of  this  were  written 
at  Florence  in  the  summer  of  1740,  and  the  rest  was 
added  at  Stoke  in  the  autumn  of  1742,  after  West's 
death.  Gray's  marginal  notes  are  given  by  Mason  and 
Mathias  as  footnotes.  Mr.  Gosse  wrongly  claims  that 
they  were  "never  before  given,"  and  gives  some  of 
them  incorrectly. 

Plan  of  the     Unde  Animus  scire  incipiat ;  quibus 

Poem.  .      I        , 

inchoet  orsa 
Principiis  seriera  rerum,  tenuemque  catenam 
Mnemosyne :  Ratio  unde  rudi  sub  pectore  tar- 

dum 
Augeat  imperium  ;  et  primura  mortalibus  aegris 
Ira,  Dolor,  Metus,  et  CuraB  nascantur  inanes, 
Invocation  to  ^inc  canere  aggredior.    Nee  dedig- 

Mr.  Locke.*  „  , 

nare  canentem. 
Oh    decus !     Angliacae    certe    O    lux    altera 

gentis ! 
Si  qua  primus  iter  monstras,  vestigia  conor 
Signare  incerta,  tremulaque  insistere  planta. 

*  John  Locke  (1638-1704) ,  author  of  the  Essay  on  thQ 
Human  Understanding. 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  251 

Quin  potius   due  ipse  (potes  namque  omnia) 

sanctum  10 

Ad  limen  (si  rite  adeo,  si  pectore  puro,) 
Obscurae  reserans  Naturae  ingentia  claustra. 
Tu  caecas  rerum  causas,  fontemque  severum 
Pande,  Pater  ;  tibi,  enim,  tibi,  veri  magna  Sa- 

cerdos, 
Corda  patent  hominum,  atque  altas  penetralia 

Mentis. 
Tuque  aures  adhibe  vacuas,  facilesque,  Fa- 

voni, 
(Quod  tibi  crescit  opus)  simplex  nee  despice 

carmen, 
Nee  vatem  :  non  ilia  leves  primordia 

Use  and  Ex- 
motus,  tentof  the 

'  Subject. 

Quanquam  parva,  dabunt.     Laetum 

vel  amabile  quicquid 
Usquam  oritur,  trahit  hinc  ortum ;  nee  surgit 

ad  auras,  20 

Quin  ea  conspirent  simul,  eventusquesecundent. 
Hine  variae  vitai"  artes,  ae  moUior  usus, 
Dulee  et  amicitiae  vinclum  :  Sapientia  dia 
Hine  roseum  accendit  lumen,  vultuque  sereno 
Humanas  aperit  mentes,   nova    gaudia  mon- 

strans 


252  LATIN  POEMS. 

Deformesque  fugat  curas,  vanosque  timores : 
Scilicet  et  rerum  crescit  pulcherrima  Virtus. 
Ilia  etiam,  quae  te  (mirum)  noctesque  diesque 
Assidue  fovet  inspirans,  linguamque  sequeatem 
Temperat  in  numeros,  atque  horas  mulcet  in- 
ertes ;  30 

Aurea  non  alia  se  jactat  origine  Musa. 
Union  of  the  Principio,  ut  masrnum  fcedus  Katura 

Soul  and  ^     '  ° 

^°^y-  creatrix 

Firmavit,  tardis  jussitque  inolescere  membris 

Sublimes  animas  ;  tenebroso  in  carcere  partem 

Noluit  setheream  longo  torpere  veterno : 

Nee  per  se  proprium  passa  exercere  vigorem 

est, 
Ke  sociae  molis  conjunctos  sperneret  artus, 
Ponderis  oblita,  et  coelestis  conscia  flammge. 
Idcirco  innumero  ductu  treraere  undique  fibras 
Office  of  the    Nervorum  instituit:  turn  toto  cor- 

Nervous 

System.  TpoYe  miscens 

Implicuit  late  ramos,  et  sensile  textum,  41 
Implevitque  humore  suo  (seu  lympha  vocanda, 
Sive  aura   est)   tenuis  certe,  atque  levissima 

quaedam 
Yis  versatur  agens,  parvosque  infusa  canales 
Perfluit ;  assidue  externis  quae  concita  plagis, 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  253 

Mobilis,  incussique  fidelis  nuntia  motus, 
Hinc  inde  accensa  contage  relabitur  usque 
Ad  superas  hominis  sedes,  arcemque  cerebri. 
Namque  illic    posuit    solium,  et    sua  templa 

sacravit 
Mens  animi :   banc   circum   coeunt,     sensation, 

the  Origin  of 

densoque  feruntur  50     our  ideas. 

Agmine  notitiae,  simulacraque  tenuia  rerum  : 
Ecce  autem  naturge  ingens  aperitur  imago 
Immensae,  variique  patent  commercia   mundi. 
Ac    uti    longinquis     descendunt     montibus 

amnes. 
Yelivolus  Tamisis,  flaventisque  Indus  arenas, 
Euphratesque,    Tagusque,    et    opimo    flumine 

Ganges, 
Undas  quisque  suas  volvens,  cursuque  sonoro 
In  mare  prorumpunt :  hos  magno  acclinis   in 

antro 
Excipit  Oceanus,  natorumque  ordine  longo  59 
Dona  recognoscit  venientum,  ultroque  serenat 
Caeruleam  faciem,  et  diffuso  marmore  ridet. 
Haud  aliter  species  properant  se  inf erre  novellaB 
Certatim   menti,  atque   aditus   quino   agmine 

complent. 
Primas  tactus  agit  partes,  primusque  rainutae 


254  LATIN  POEMS. 

Laxat  iter  cascum  turbae,  recipitque  ruentem. 
Non  idem  huic  modus  est,  qui  fratribus :  am- 

plius  ille 
The  Touch,     Imperium  affectat  senior,  penitusque 

our  first  and  .,^„^,,n;„ 

most  exten-  medulllS, 

Bive  Sense.  i     i  . 

Vlsceribusque   habitat  totis,   pellis- 

que  recentem 
Funditur  in  telam,  et  late  per  stamina  vivit. 
Necdum  etiam  matris  puer  eluctatus  ab  alvo  70 
Multiplices  solvit  tunicas,  et  vincula  rupit 
Sopitus  molli  somno,  tepidoque  liquore 
Circumfusus  adhuc :  tactus  tamen  aura  lacessit 
Jamdudum  levior  sensus,  animamque  reclusit. 
Idque   magis   simul,  ac   solitum   blandumque 

calorem 
Frigore  rautavit  coeli,  quod  verberat  acri 
Impete  inassuetos  artus :  tum  ssevior  adstat 
Humanasque  comes  vitae  Dolor  excipit ;  ille 
Cunctantem    frustra    et    tremulo    multa    ore 

querentem  T9 

Sight,  our      Corripit    invadens,    ferreisque    am- 

second  .  . 

Sense.  plectitur  ulnis. 

Turn  species  primiim  patefacta  est  Candida 
Lucis 
(Usque  vices  adeo  Natura  bonique,  malique. 


J 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  255 

Exaequat,  justaque  manu  sua  damna  rependit 
Tum  primum,  ignotosque  bibunt  nova  lumina 

soles. 
Carmine  quo,  Dea,  te  dicam,  gra-      Digression 

tissima  coeli  ^'^  ^'^*^'- 

Progenies,  ortumque  tuum ;  gemmantia  rore 
Ut  per  prata  levi  lustras,  et  floribus  halans 
Purpureum  Veris  greraium,  scenamque  viren- 

tem 
Pingis,  et  umbriferos  colles,  et  caerula  regna? 
Gratia   te,  Yenerisque   Lepos,  et   mille   Colo- 
rum, 
Formarumque  chorus   sequitur,  motusque   de- 

centes.  91 

At  caput  invisum  Stygiis  Nox  atra  tenebris 
Abdidit,  horrendaeque  simul  Formidinis  ora, 
Pervigilesque    aestus    Curarum,  atque    anxius 

Angor : 
Undique  laetitia  florent  mortalia  corda, 
Purus  et  arridet  largis  fulgoribus  ^Ether. 
Omnia  nee  tu  ideo    invalidae    se    pandere 

Menti 
(Quippe  nimis  teneros  posset  vis  tanta  diei 
Perturbare,  et  inexpertos  confundere  visus)  99 
Nee  capere  infantes  animos,  neu  cernere  credas 


256  LATIN  POEMS. 

Tara  variam  molem,  et  mirae  spectacula  lucis : 
Sight,  imper.  ^^sclo  qua  tamen  base  oculos  dulce- 

feet  at  first,  ^;^„  »,„„„„_ 

gradually  ttme  parvos 

improves.  o    i        i  •  i 

bplendida  percussit  novitas,  traxit- 

que  sequentes ; 
Nonne  videmus  enim,  latis  inserta  fenestris 
Sicubi  se  Phoebi  dispergant  aurea  tela, 
Sive  lucernarum  rutilus  colluxerit  ardor, 
Extemplo  hue    obverti    aciem,  quae   fixa  re- 

pertos 
Haurit  inexpletum  radios,  fruiturque  tuendo. 

Altior  huic  vero  sensu,  majorque  videtur 
Addita,  Judicioque  arete  connexa  potestas,  110 
Quod    simul  atque  aetas  volventibus  auxerit 

annis, 
Ideas  of         ^sec  simul,  assiduo  depaseens  omnia 

Beauty,  Pro-  _•   „ 

portion,  and  viou, 

Perspieiet,  vis  quanta  loci,  quid  pol- 
leat  ordo, 
Juncturae  quis  bonos,  ut  res  accendere  rebus 
Lumina  eonjurant  inter  se,  et  mutua  fulgent. 

Hearing,  also       ^^^  ^^^^^^  ^^  geminis  viget  auri- 
byreludV  bus  insita  virtus, 

meut.  -»T  • 

JNec  tantum  m  curvis  qua3  pervigil 
excubet  antris 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  257 

Hinc  atque  hinc  (ubi  Yox  tremefecerit  ostia 

pulsu 
Aeriis  invecta  rotis)  longeque  recurset :        119 
Scilicet  Eloquio  haec  sonitus,  haec  f  ulminis  alas, 
Et  mulcere  dedit  dictis  et  toUere  corda, 
Yerbaque  metiri  numeris,  versuque  ligare 
Kepperit,  et  quicquid  discant  Libethrides  undse, 
Calliope  quoties,  quoties  Pater  ipse  canendi 
Evolvat  liquidum  carmen,  calamove  loquenti 
Inspiret  dulces  animas,  digitisque  figuret. 
At  medias  fauces,  et  linguae  humen-  Taste. 

tia  templa 
Gustus  habet,  qua  se  insinuet  jucunda  saporum 
Luxuries,  dona  Autumni,  Bacchique  voluptas. 
Naribus    interea    consedit    odora         gmeii. 
hominum  vis, 
Docta  leves  captare  auras,  Panchai'a  quales  131 
Vera  novo  exhalat,  Floraeve  quod  oscula  fra- 
grant, 
Roscida,  cum  Zephyri  furtim  sub  vesperis  hora 
Respondet  votis,  mollemque  aspirat  amorera. 
Tot  portas  altae  capitis  circumde-      Reflection 

j-i.        p.-  the  other 

UlU  tllL-l  source  of 

.  ,  T->  .  our  Ideas. 

Alma   Parens,   sensusque    vias    per 

membra  reclusit ; 
17 


258  LATIN  POEMS. 

Haud  solas :  namque  intiis  agit  vivata  f acultas, 

Qua  sese  explorat,  contemplatusque  repente 

Ipse  suas  animus  vires,  momentaquc  cernit.  139 

Quid  velit,  aut  possit,  cupiat,  fugiatve,  vicissim 

Percipit  imperio  gaudens ;  neque  corpora  fallunt 

Morigera  ad  celeres  actus,  ac  numina  mentis. 

Qualis  Hamadryadum  quondam  si  forte  so- 
rorum 

Una,  novos  peragrans  saltus,  et  devia  rura ; 

(Atque  illam  in  viridi  suadet  procumbere  ripa 

Fontis  pura  quies,  et  opaci  frigoris  umbra) 

Dura  prona  in  latices  speculi  de  margine  pendet, 

Mirata  est   subitam  venienti  occurrere   Nym- 

pham: 
Mox  eosdem,  quos  ipsa,  artus,  eadera  ora  geren- 

tem 
Una  inferre  gradus,  una  succedere  sylvae      150 
Aspicit  alludens  ;  seseque  agnoscit  in  undis. 
Sic  sensu  interno  rerum  simulacra  suarum 
Mens     ciet,    et     proprios     observat     conscia 

Ideas  ap-  Trnlfna 

proachthe  VUltUS. 

Soul,  some  .  ... 

bysiuKie        jvjec  ver6  simplex  ratio,  aut  ius  om- 

avenues,  ^  " 

X^V",''  nibus  unum 

every    ense.  QQjjg^.^|.  imaginibus.     Sunt  quse  bina 

ostia  norunt  j 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  259 

Hae  privos  servant  aditus  ;  sine  legibus  illaB 
Passim,  qua  data  porta,  ruunt,  animoque  pro- 

pinquant. 
Kespice,  cui  a  cunis  tristes  extinxit    lustration, 

OCelloS,  ¥ia^^eot 

-,  .  • ,  J  the  first. 

Saeva  et  in  eternas  mersit   natura 

tenebras : 
lUi  ignota  dies  lucet,  vernusque  colorum      160 
Offusus  nitor  est,  et  vivae  gratia  forraae. 
Corporis  at  filura,  et  motus,  spatium-    ^.^  ^^^  ^^ 

que  locique  ^S'luhf 

Intervalla    datur    certo    dignoscere    ^^^^'^  ' 

tactu : 
Quandoquidem  his  iter  ambiguum  est,  et  janua 

duplex, 
Exclusaeque  oculis  species  irrumpere  tendunt 
Per  digitos.     Atqui  solis  concessa  potestas 
Luminibus  blandae  est  radios  imraittere  lucis. 
Undique  proporro  sociis,  quacun-     pleasure, 

^  '        ^  ^  Pain  of  the 

que  patescit  third. 

Notitiae  campus,  mistae  lasciva  feruntur        169 
Turba    voluptatis    comites,   form^eque    dolor- 

um 
Terribiles    visu,    et    porta    giomerantur    in 

ouini. 


260  LATIN  POEMS. 


Also  Power    ^^^  vario  minus  intro'itu  magnum 

UnifyXl''  inguit  Illud, 

cession,  Du-  .      <•  • 

ration.  Quo  lacere  et  fungi,  quo  res  exis- 

tere  circum 
Quamque  sibi  proprio  cum  corpore  scimus,  et 

ire 
Ordine,  perpetuoque  per  aDvum  flumine  labi. 

Nunc  age  quo  valeat  pacto,  qua  sensilis  arte 
Primary        Affcctarc  viam,  atque  animi  tentare 

Qualities  of 

^o^i^s.  late  bras 

Materies  (dictis  aures  adverte  faventes) 

Exsequar.      Imprimis   spatii  quam  multa  per 

asquor 
Millia  multigenis  pandant  se  corpora  seclis,  180 
Expende.     Haud  unum  invenies,  quod  mente 

licebit 
Amplecti,  nedum  proprius  deprendere  sensu, 
„     .^  ,       Mo] is   egens   certae,  aut  solido  sine 

Magnitude,  o  ' 

gj^r  robore,  cujus 

Denique  mobilitas  linquit,  texturave 
partes, 
Ulla  nee  orarum  circumcaesura  coercet. 
Haec  conjuncta  ade5  tota  compage  fatetur 
Mundus,  et  extremo  clamant  in  limine  rerum, 
(Si  rebus  datur  extremnm)  primordia.     Firmat 


DE  PRINCIPIIS  COGITANDI.  261 

Ilsec  eadem  tactus  (tactura  quis  dicere  falsum 
Audeat  ?)  hsec  oculi  nee  lucidus  arguit  orbis.  190 

Inde  potestatum  enasci  deusissima  proles  ; 
Kam  quodcunque  ferit  visum,  tangive  laborat, 
Quicquid  nare  bibis,  vel  concava  concipit  auris, 
Quicquid  lingua  sapit,  credas  hoc  omne,  necesse 

est 
Ponderibus,  textu,  discursu,  mole,  figura 
Particulas  praestare  leves,  et  semina  rerum. 
Nunc  oculos  igitur  pascunt,  et  luce  ministra 
Fulgere  cuncta  vides,  spargique  coloribus  or- 

bem, 

Dum  de  sole  trahunt  alias,  aliasque  superne  199 

Detorquent,retr6que  docent  se  vertere  flammas. 

Nunc  trepido  inter  se  fervent  corpuscula  pulsu, 

Ut  tremor  aethera  per  magnum,  lateque  natantes 

Aurarum  fluctus  avidi  vibrantia  claustra 

Auditus  queat  allabi,  sonitumque  propaget. 

Cominus  interdum  non  uUo  interprete  per  se 

Nervorum  invadunt  teneras  quatientia  fibras, 

Sensiferumque  urgent  ultro  per  viscera  motum. 
***** 


262  LATIN  POEMS. 

LiBEK    SeCUNDUS.* 

Begun  at  Stoke,  June,  1743. f 

Hactenus  baud  segnis  Naturae  arcana  retexi 
Musarum  interpres,  primusque  Britanna  per 

arva 
Romano  liquidum  deduxi  flumine  rivum. 
Cum  Tu  opere  in  medio,  spes  tanti  et  causa 

laboris, 
Linquis,  et  asternam  fati  te  condis  in  umbram ! 
Vidi  egomet  duro  graviter  concussa  dolore 
Pectora,  in  alterius  non  unquam  lenta  dolorem  ; 
Et  languere  oculos  vidi,  et  pallescere  amantem 
Yultum,  quo  nunquam  Pietas  nisi  rara,  Fides- 

que,  9 

Altus  amor  Veri,  et  purum  spirabat  Honestum. 
Visa  tamen  tardi  demum  inclementia  morbi 
Cessare  est,  reducemque  iterum  roseo  ore  Sa- 

lutem 
Speravi,  atque  una  tecum,  dilecte  Favoni ! 
Credulus  beu  longos,  ut  quondam,  fallere  Soles  : 

*  In  the  Pembroke  MS,  it  is  '  Secundus,'  but  in  all 
printed  copies  it  is  '  Quartus.' 
t  Entry  in  Pembroke  MS. 


LATIN  POEMS.  263 

Heu    spes    nequicquam    dulces,    atque    irrita 

vota ! 
Heu  msestos  Soles,  sine  te  quos  ducere  flendo 
Per  desideria,  et  questus  jam  cogor  inanes  ! 
At  Tu,  sancta  anima,  et   nostri  non  indiga 

lustus, 
Stellanti  templo,  sincerique  aetheris  igne, 
Uude  orta  es,  fruere ;  atque  oh  si  secura,  nee 

ultra  20 

Mortalis,  notos  olim  miserata  labores 
Respectes,  tenuesque  *  vacet  cognoscere  curas  ; 

Humanara  si  forte  alta  de  sede  procellam 

Contemplere,    metus,     stimulosque     cupidinis 

acres, 
Gaudiaque  et  gemitus,  parvoque  in  corde  tu- 

multum 
Irarum  ingentem,  et  saevos  sub  pectore  fluetus ; 
Respice  et  has   lacrymas,  memori  quas  ictus 

amore 

Fundo ;  quod  possum,  juxta  lugere  sepulchrum 

Dum  juvat,  et  mutae  vana  haec  jactare  faviliae. 
***** 

*  In    the  Pembroke  MS.  it  is    '  parvas,'  and  in  the 
margin  '  tenues.' 


264  LATIN  POEMS. 

XXI. 

Not  dated,  but  evidently  written  after  his  return 
from  the  Continent  in  1741.  It  is  an  echo  of  the  stanza 
from  Genoa, — "  Horridos  tractus,  etc." 

It  is  in  the  Commonplace  Book,  and  was  first  printed 
by  Mr.  Tovey. 

Oh  ubi  coUes,  ubi  Fsesularum 
Palladis  curae,  plaga,  Formiaeque 
Prodigse  florum,  Genuaeque  amantes 

Littora  soles  ! 
Abstulit  campos  oculis  amoenos 
Montium  quantus,  nemorumque  tractus! 
Quot  natant  eheu !  medii  prof  undo 

Marmore  fluctus  ? 


XXII. 
FROM   PETRARCH.* 

Uror,  io ;  veros  at  nemo  credidit  ignes : 
Quin  credunt  omnes  ;  dura  sed  ilia  negat, 

Ilia  negat,  soli  voluraus  cui  posse  probare ; 
Quin  videt,  et  visos  improba  dissimulat. 

*  First  published  by  Mathias,  in  1814, 


FROM  THE  ANTHOLOGIA  GR^CA.        265 

Ah,   durissiraa    mi,   sed  et,    ah,  pulcherrima 
rerum  ! 

Nonne  aDimam  in  misera,   Cynthia,  fronte 
vides  ? 
Omnibus  ilia  pia  est  ;  et,  si  non  fata  vetassent, 

Tam  longas  mentem  flecteret  ad  lacrymas. 
Sed  tamen  has  lacrymas,  hunc  tu,  quem  spre- 
veris,  ignem, 

Carminaque  auctori  non   bene  culta  suo,   10 
Turba  futurorum  non  ignorabit  amantum  : 

Nos  duo,  cumque  erimus  parvus  uterque  cinis, 
Jamque  faces,  eheu  !  oculorum,  et  frigida  lingua, 

Hae  sine  luce  jacent,  immemor  ilia  loqui  ; 
Infelix  musa  oeternos  spirabit  amores, 

Ardebitque  urna  multa  fa  villa  mea. 


XXIII. 
FROM  THE  ANTHOLOGIA  GR^CA.* 

Fektur  Aristophanis  fatorum  arcana  rogatum 
tempore  sementis,  rusticus  isse  domum  ; 

Sideris  an  felix  tempestas,  messis  an  esset 
magna,  vel  agricolam  falleret  ustus  ager) 

*  Mr.  Gray  paid  very  particular  attention  to  the  An- 
thologia   Groeca,  and  he  enriched  an  interleaved  edi- 


366  LATIN  POEMS. 

Ille  supercilio  adducto  multa  anxius  arte 

disposuit  sortes,  consuluitque  Deos  : 
Turn  responsa  dedit :  vernus  suifecerit  imber 

Si  modo,  nee  fruges  IjBserit  herba  nocens ; 
Si  mala  robigo,  si  grando  pepercerit  arvis, 

attulerit  subitum  pigra  nee  aura  gelu ;        10 
Caprea  si  nulla,  aut  culmos  attriverit  baedus  ; 

nee  fuerit  eaelum,  nee  tibi  terra  gravis  : 
Largas  pollieeor  segetes,  atque  horrea  plena. 

tu  tamen,  ut  veniat  seta  loeusta,  cave.* 

FROM  THE  GREEK  OF  ANTIPHILUS  BYZANTIUS. 

In  Medece  Imaginem^  Nohile  Timornachi  Opus. 

En  ubi  Medeae  varius  dolor  gestuat  ore, 
Jamque    animum    nati,    jamque     maritus, 
habent ! 

Sueeenset;   miseret;  medio  exardeseit   amore 
Dum  furor,  inque  oeulo  guttarainante  tremit. 

tion  of  it  (by  Henry  Stephens  in  1566)  with  copious 
notes,  with  parallel  passages  from  various  authors,  and 
with  some  conjectural  emendations  of  the  text. — 
Mathias. 

Mathias  published  only  eleven  of  the  imitations  ; 
all  are  here  given  from  the  Pembroke  Commonplace 
Books,  for  the  first  time  together  and   in  Gray's  order. 

*  First  printed  by  Mr.  Tovey,  in  Gray  and  his  Friends, 
1890,  from  the  Commonplace  Books. 


FROM  THE  ANTHOLOGIA  GR.ECA.        267 

Cernis  adhuc  dubiam  ;  quid  enim  ?  licet  impia 
matris 
Colchidos,  at  non  sit  dextera  Timomachi. 

IMITATION  OF  THE  GREEK  OF  PAUL  8ILENTIAKIUS. 

In  BacchcB  Furentis  Statuam. 

Credite,   non    viva    est    Maenas;   non  spirat 
imago : 
Artificis  rabiem  miscuit  aere  manus. 

FROM   THE    GREEK   OF   P0SIDIPPU8. 

In  Alexandrum,   ^re  Effictum. 

Quantum  audet,  Lysippe,  manus  tua  !  surgit  in 
aere 
Spiritus,  atque  oculis  bellicus  ignis  adest : 
Spectate  hos  vultus,  miserisque  ignoscite  Per- 
sis  : 
Quid  mirum,  imbelles  si  leo  sparsit  oves  ? 

from    the    GREEK. 

In  Niobes  Statuam. 

Feoerat  e  viva  lapidera  me  Jupiter ;  at  me 
Praxiteles  vivam  reddidit  e  lapide. 


268  LATIN  POEMS. 

FROM  THE  GREEK    OF  LUCIAN. 

Offering  a  Statue  of  herself  to  Venus.* 

Te  tibi,  sancta,  fero   nudam  ;  f  formosius  ipsg 
Cum  tibi,  quod  ferrem,  te,  Dea,  nil  habui. 

FROM  THE  GREEK  OF  STATYLLIUS  FLACCUS. 

In  Amor  em  Dormientem.% 

DooTE  puer  vigiles  mortalibus  addere  curas, 

Anne  potest  in  te  somnus  habere  locum  ? 
Laxi  juxta  arcus,  et  fax  suspensa  quiescit, 

Dormit  et  in  pharetra  clausa  sagitta  sua  ; 
Long6  mater  abest,  longe  Cythereia  turba : 

Verum  ausint  alii  te  prope  ferre  pedera, 
Non   ego  ;    nam  metui  valde,  mihi,   perfide, 
quiddam 

Forsan  et  in  somnis  ne  meditere  mali. 

*Mathias  by  some  slip  inserted  "A  Nymph" 
before  "  offering,"  making  nonsense  of  the  title  ;  and 
in  this  he  has  been  followed  by  all  subsequent  editors, 

f  '  En  tibi  te,  Cytherea,  fero,'  in  margin  of  Pem- 
broke MS. 

X  Auth.  iv.  218 — "  Catullianam  illam  spirat  mol- 
litiem."— 6rra2/. 


FROM  THE  ANTHOLOGIA  GR^CA.       269 

From  a  Fragment  *  of  Flato.f 

Itur  in  Idalios  tractus,  felicia  regna, 

Fundit  ubi  densam  m3'rtea  sylva  comam, 
Intus  Amor  teneram  visus  spirare  quietem, 

Dum  roseo  roseos  imprirait  ore  toros  ; 
Sublimem  procul  a  ramis  pendere  pharetram, 

Et  de  languidula  spicula  lapsa  manu, 
Vidimus,  et  risu  molii  diducta  labella 

Murmure  quae  assiduo  pervolitabat  apis. 

FROM  THE  GREEK  OF  MARIANUS. 

In  Foniem  aqucB  Calidoe. 

Sub  platanis  puer  Idalius  prope  fluminis  undam 

Dormiit,  in  ripa  deposuitque  facem. 
Tempus  adest,   sociae!  Nympharum  audentior 
una, 
Tempus  adest :  ultra  quid  dubitamus  ?  ait. 
Uicet  incurrit,  pestem  ut  divumque  hominum- 
que 
Lampada  collectis  exanimarct  aquis. 

*Antb.  iv.  210— "  ElegaBtissi  mum  hercle  frag- 
mentum,  quod  sic  Latine  nostro  modo  adumbravi- 
mus." — Oray. 

]  The  second  of  the  name. 


22— Q  &  G— Z 


270  LATIN  POEMS. 

Demens!    nam     nequiit    seevam    restinguere 
flammam 
Nympha,  sed  ipsa  ignes  traxit,  et  inde  calet. 

FROM  LUCILLIUS. 

Ikrepsisse  suas  murem  videt  Argus  in  aedes, 
Atque  ait,  heus,  a  me  numquid,  amice,  velis  ? 

Ille  autem  ridens,  metuas  nihil,  inquit,  apud  te, 
O  bone,  non  epulas,  hospitium  petimus. 

IMITATED  FROM  THE  GREEK  OF  POSIDIPPUTS. 

Ad  Amor  em. 

Patjlisper  vigiles,  oro,  compesce  dolores, 

Respue  nee  Musae  supplicis  aure  preces  ; 

Oro    brevem    lacrymis     veniam,     requiemque 
f  urori : 

Ah,  ego  non  possum  vulnera  tanta  pati ! 
Intima  flamma,  vides,  miseros  depascitur  artus, 

Surgit  et  extremis  spiritus  in  labiis : 
Quod  si  tarn  tenuem  cordi  est  exsoivere  vitara, 

Stabit  in  opprobrium  sculpta  querela  tuum. 
Juro  perque  faces  istas,  arcumque  sonantem, 

Spiculaque  hoc  unum  figere  docta  jecur ; 
Hea  fuge  crudelem  puerum,  saevasque  sagittas  ! 

Huic  fuit  exitii  causa,  viator,  Amor. 


FROM  THE  ANTHOLOGIA  GR^CA.         271 

[imitated  from  the  greek]  of  bassus.* 

!NoN  ego,  cum  malus  urit  amor,  lovis  induor 
arma; 
nil  mihi  cum  plumis,  nil  mihi  cum  corio. 
Non  ego   per    tegulas  mittor    liquefactus    in 
aurum : 
promo  duos  obolos  ;  sponte  venit  Danae. 

[imitated  from  the  greek]  of  rufinus. 

Hang  tibi  Kufinus  mittit,  Khodoclea,  coronam, 
Has  tibi  decerpens  texerat  ipse  rosas ; 

Est  viola,  est  anemone,  est  suave-rubens  hya- 
cinthus, 
Mistaque  Narcisso  lutea  caltha  suo : 

Sume  ;  sed  aspiciens,  ah,  fidere  desine  formae ; 

Qui  pingit,  brevis  est,  sertaque  teque,  color. 

*  First  printed  in  Qray  and  his  Friends, 


272  LATIN  POEMS. 

XXIY. 

GENERIC  CHARACTERS 

OF  THE  ORDERS  OF  INSECTS, 

and  of  the  Genera  of  the^first  six  Orders,  named  Coleop- 
tera,  Hemiptera,  Lepidoptera,  Neuroptera,  Hymenop- 
tera,  and  Diptera  ;  expressed  in  Technical  Verses. 
First  published  in  Mathias'  edition  of  Gray's  Works. 

I.  COLEOPTERA. 

Alas  lorica  tectas  Coleoptera  jactant. 

Antennis  Clavatis. 
Serra  pedum  prodit  Scarabasum  et  fissile  cornu. 
Dermesti  antennae  circum  ambit  lamina  caulem, 
Qui  caput  incurvum  timidus  sub  corpore  celat. 
In  pectus  retrahens  caput  abdit  claviger  Hister. 
Occiput  Attelabi  in  posticum  vergit  acumen. 
Curculio  ingenti  protendit  cornua  rostro. 
Silpha  leves  peltae  atque  elytrorum  exporrigit 

oras. 
Truncus  apex  clavse,  atque  antennula  Coccio- 

nellae. 

Anteimis  Filiformihus. 
Cassida  sub  clypei  totam  se  margine  condit. 
Chrysomela  inflexa  loricae  stringitur  ora. 


OF  THE  ORDERS  OP  INSECTS.  273 

Gibba  caput  Meloe  incurvat,  thorace  rotundo. 
Oblongus  frontem  et  tenues  clypei  exerit  oras 
Tenebrio.      Abdomen  Mordellae  lamina  vestit. 
Curta  elytra  ostentat  Staphylis,  caudamque  re- 
curvam. 

Antennis  Setaceis. 

Tubere  cervicis  valet,  antennisque  Cerambyx. 
Pectore  Leptura  est  tereti,  corpusque  coarctat. 
Flexile  Cantharidis  tegmen,  lateruraque  papillae. 
Ast  Elater  resilit  sterni  mucrone  supinus. 
Maxilla  exerta  est  oculoque  Cicindela  grandi. 
Bupresti  antennae  graciles,  cervice  retracta. 
Nee  Dytiscus  iners  setosa  remige  planta. 
EflBgiem  cordis  Carabus  dat  pectore  trunco. 
Necydalis  curto  ex  elytro  nudam  explicat  alam. 
Curtum,  at  Forficulse  tegit  banc,  cum  forcipe 

caudae. 
Depressum  BlattaB  corpus,  venterque  bicornis. 
Dente  vorax  Gryllus  deflexis  saltitat  alls. 

II.  Hemiptera. 

Dimidiam  rostrata  gerunt  Hemiptera  crustam. 

Fcemina  serpit  humi  interdum :  volat  aethere 

conjux- 
iS 


274  LATIN  POEMS. 

Rostro  Nepa  rapax  pollet,  chelisque :  Cicada 
Remigio  alarum  et  rostrato  pectore  saltat. 
Tela  Cimex  inflexa  gerit,  cruce  complicat  alas 
Notonecta  crucem  quoque  fert,  remosque   pe- 

dales ; 
Cornua  Aphis  caudle  et  rostrum ;  saepe  erigit 

alas ; 
Deprimit  has  Chermes,    dum   saltat,    pectore 

gibbo. 
Coccus  iners  caudae  setas,  volitante  marito  ; 
Thrips  alas  angusta  gerit,  caudamque  recur vam. 

III.  Lepidopteea. 

Squamam     alas,   linguae    spiram   Lepidoptera 

jactant. 
Papilio  clavam  et  squamosas  subrigit  alas. 
Prismaticas   Sphinx   antennas,    medioque    tu- 

mentes ; 
At  conicas  gravis  extendit  sub  nocte  Phalaena. 

lY.  Neuroptera. 

Rete    alae   nudum,  atque  hamos  Nenroptera 

caudae. 
Dente  alisque  potens,  secat  aethera  longa  Libella. 
Cauda  setigera,  erectis  stat  Ephemera  pennis. 


OF  THE  ORDERS  OF  INSECTS.  275 

Phryganea  elinguis  rugosas  deprimit  alas, 
Hemerinusque  bidens  ;  planas  tamen  explicat 

ille; 
Et  rostro  longo  et  cauda  Panorpa  minatur. 
Raphidia  extento  coUo  setam  trahit  unam. 

V.  Hymenoptera. 

At  vitreas  alas,  jaculumque  Hymenoptera  caudae 
Fceraineo  data  tela  gregi,  maribusque  negata. 

Telum  abdit  spirale  Cynips,  morsuque  minatur. 
Maxillas  Tenthredo  movet,  serramque  bivalvem. 
Ichneumon  gracili  triplex  abdomine  telum. 
Haurit  Apis  lingua  incurva  quod  vindicat  ense. 
Sphex  alam  expandit  laevem,  gladiumque  re- 

condit. 
Alee  ruga  notat  Vespam  caudaeque  venenum, 
Squamula  Formicam  tergi  telumque  pedestrem. 

Dum  minor  alata  volitat  cum  conjuge  conjux. 
Mutilla  iinpennis,  sed  cauda  spicula  vibrat. 

VI.    DiPTERA. 

Diptera  sub  geminis  alis  se  pondere  librant. 
Os  Oestro  nullum  est,  caudaque  timetur  inermi. 


276 


LATIN  POEMS. 


Longa  caput  Tipula  est,  labiisque  et  prasdita 

palpis. 
Palpis  Musca   caret,    retrahitque   proboscida 

labris  ; 
Qua  Tabanus  gaudet  pariter,  palpis  sub  acutis. 
Os  Culicis  molli  e  pharetra  sua  spicula  vibrat, 
Rostrum  Empis  durum  et  longum  sub  pectore 

curvat ; 
Porrigit  articuli  de  cardine  noxia  Conops, 
Porrigit    (at    rectum  et    couicum)    sitibundus 

Asilus, 
Lougura  et  Bombylius,  qui  sugit  mella  volando. 
Unguibus    Hippobosca    valet ;    vibrat    breve 

telum. 

VII.  Aptera. 
Aptera  se  pedibus  pennarum  nescia  jactant. 


h 


NOTES. 
I.— ODE  ON  THE  SPRING. 

This  Ode  was  written  at  Stoke  in  June,  1742, 
and  sent  by  Gray  to  his  school  friend,  West,  at 
Hatfield  in  Hertfordshire,  but  was  returned  as 
West  had  died  on  the  first  of  the  month. 

The  copy  in  Gray's  handwriting  in  his 
Commonplace  Books  (otherwise  known  as  the 
Stonehewer  MSS.  at  Pembroke  College),  is  en- 
titled "  Noon-Tide,  an  Ode."  At  the  foot,  Gray 
has  written: — "The  beginning  of  June  1742, 
sent  to  Fav. :  not  knowing  he  was  then  dead." 
Favonius  was  Gray's  name  for  West. 

It  was  first  published  in  1748  in  the  seeond 
volume  of  Dodsley's  "  Collection  of  Poems  by 
Several  Hands,"  under  the  title  of  "  Ode,"  and 
without  the  author's  name ;  it  next  appeared 
as  the  first  poem  in  the  "  Designs  by  Mr.  Bent- 
ley  for  Six  Poems  by  Mr.  T.  Gray,"  published 
in  1753,  still  called  merely  "  Ode."  The  notes 
were  first  added  by  Gray  in  the  edition  of  1768. 

Mitford  says  this  Ode  is  formed  on  Horace's 
Ode,  "  Ad  Sestium,"  i.  4  ;  but  Gray  seems  to 

have  been  fresh  from  Milton  and  Green, — the 

277 


278  NOTES. 

moral  he  says  is  from  the  latter,  and  observe 
how  many  words  and  expressions  are  from 
Milton. 

5.  The  Attic  warbler^  the  nightingale.  The 
neighbourhood  of  Athens  abounded  with  night- 
ingales, reference  to  which  is  made  by  Sopho- 
cles, and  connected  with  this  fact  is  the  fable 
that  Philomela,  the  daughter  of  Pandion,  king 
of  Attica,  was  turned  into  a  nightingale.  Gray 
had  in  mind  the  well-known  description  of 
Athens  in  "  Paradise  Regained  "  : — 

"  Plato's  retirement,  where  the  Attic  bird 
Trills  her  tlnck-ivarbled  notes  the  summer  long." 

— iv.  245. 

potirs  her  throat.  Throat  is  used  by  metonymy 
for  "  song  from  her  throat."  It  was  the  throat 
of  birds  that  poets  generally  speak  of  when 
they  refer  to  their  singing.  Cf.  "  full-gorged 
lark,"  and 

"  When  the  linnet-like  confided,  I 
With  shriller  throat  shall  sing." 

—Lovelace,  ToAlthea. 

Keats  in  his  "  Ode  to  a  Nightingale  "  speaks  of 
it  as  singing  "  in  full-throated  ease,"  "pouring 
forth  her  soul "  ;  and  Shelley  : — 

"  Hail  to  thee,  blithe  Spirit, 
That  from  heaven  or  near  it 
Pourest  thy  full  heart."— To  a  Skylark, 


ODE  ON  THE  SPRING.  279 

Gray's  expression  is  taken  from  Pope's  "  Essay 
on  Man  "  : — 

"  Is  it  for  thee  the  linnet  pours  his  throat  ?  " 

— iii.  33, 

24.  The  husy  murinur.  In  the  same  passage 
referred  to  in  note  on  line  5,  Milton  has : — 

"the  sound 
Of  bees'  industrious  murmur." 

— Par.  Regained,  iv,  247. 

31-40.  In  a  letter  to  Horace  Walpole,  written 
in  1748,*  Gray  refers  to  his  having  taken  these 
ideas  from  Green.     The  passage  is  as  follows  : — 

"  I  send  you  a  bit  of  a  thing  for  two  reasons  ; 
first,  because  it  is  of  one  of  vour  favourites,  Mr. 
M.  Green  ;  and  next,  because  I  would  do  justice. 
The  thought  on  which  my  second  Ode  f  turns 
is  manifestly  stole  from  hence  ;  not  that  I  knew 
it  at  the  time,  but  having  seen  this  many  years 
before,  to  be  sure  it  imprinted  itself  on  my 
memory,  and,  forgetting  the  author,  I  took  it 
for  my  own.  The  subject  was  the  "  Queen's 
Hermitage." 

42.  Writing  to  Gray,  January  8, 1761,  Mason 
says  : — " '  Celibate  life,'  says  Jeremy  Taylor, 

*  Wrongly  placed  by  Mitford  and  Gosse. 
\  The  "  Ode  on  the  Spring  "  was  the  second  of  Gray's 
Odes  in  Dodsley'a  "  Collection." 


280  NOTES 

*  like  the  fly  in  the  heart  of  an  apple,  dwells  in 
a  perpetual  sweetness,  but  sits  alone,  and  is 
confined,  and  dies  in  singularity.  But  mar- 
riage, like  the  useful  bee,  builds  a  house,  gath- 
ers sweetness  from  every  flower,  labours  and 
unites  into  societies  and  republics,  etc'  If  I 
survive  you,  and  come  to  publish  your  works,  I 
shall  quote  this  passage,  from  whence  you  so 
evidently  (without  ever  seeing  it)  took  that 
thought,  'Poor  moralist,  and  what  art  thou,' 
etc.  But  the  plagiarism  had  been  too  glaring, 
had  you  taken  the  heart  of  the  apple,  in  which, 
however,  the  great  beauty  of  the  thought  con- 
sists. After  all,  why  will  you  not  read  Jeremy 
Taylor  ?  Take  my  word  and  more  for  it,  he  is 
the  Shakespeare  of  divines." 

49.  Thy  sun  is  set.  The  sunshine  is  the 
period  in  which  the  insects  flourish,  but  that 
part  of  his  life  is  over. 

Compare  the  following  lines  from  Black- 
stone's  "  Farewell  to  his  Muse,"  also  published 
in  Dodsley's  "  Collection  "  in  1Y48  :— 

"  Thus  though  my  noon  of  life  be  past, 
Yet  let  my  setting  sun,  at  last, 
Find  out  the  still  the  rural  cell." 


ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A  FAVOURITE  CAT.  281 


II.— ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A 
FAYOUKITE  CAT 

This  Ode  was  sent  in  a  letter  to  Horace  Wal- 
pole,  dated  March  1, 1747,  on  the  occasion  of 
the  death  of  one  of  his  cats  ;  at  the  same  time, 
Gray  sent  a  copy  of  it  to  Thomas  Wharton, 
describing  it,  in  mock-heroic  style,  as  the  "  most 
noble  of  my  performances  latterly."  There  is 
a  third  copy  in  his  handwriting  in  the  Pem- 
broke MSS.  The  letter  to  Walpole  is  as  fol- 
lows : — 

"  Cambridge,  March  1,  1747. 

"  As  one  ought  to  be  particularly  careful  to 
avoid  blunders  in  a  compliment  of  condolence, 
it  would  be  a  sensible  satisfaction  to  me  (before 
I  testify  my  sorrow,  and  the  sincere  part  I  take 
in  your  misfortune)  to  know,  for  certain,  who 
it  is  I  lament.  I  knew  Zara  and  Selima  (Selima, 
was  it  %  or  Fatima  ?)  or  rather  I  knew  them 
both  together  ;  for  I  cannot  justly  say  which 
was  which.  Then  as  to  your  handsome  Cat, 
the  name  you  distinguish  her  by,  I  am  no  less 
at  a  loss,  as  well  knowing  one's  handsome  cat 
is  always  the  cat  one  likes  best  ;  or,  if  one 
be  alive  and  the  other  dead,  it  is  usually  the 
latter  that  is  the  handsomest.  Besides,  if  the 
point  were  never  so  clear,  I  hope  you  do  not 


282  NOTES. 

think  me  so  ill-bred  or  so  imprudent  as  to  for- 
feit all  my  interest  in  the  survivor ;  oh  no !  I 
would  rather  seem  to  mistake,  and  imagine  to 
be  sure  it  must  be  the  tabby  one  that  had  met 
with  this  sad  accident.  Till  this  affair  is  a 
little  better  determined,  you  will  excuse  me  if 
I  do  not  begin  to  cry  : — 

'Tempus  inane  peto,  requiem,  spatiumque  doloris.' 

Which  interval  is  the  more  convenient,  as  it 
gives  time  to  rejoice  with  you  on  your  new 
honours.*  This  is  only  a  beginning  ;  I  reckon 
next  week  we  shall  hear  you  are  a  free-mason, 
or  a  Gormogonf  at  least. — Heigh  ho  !  I  feel 
(as  you  to  be  sure  have  done  long  since)  that  I 
have  very  little  to  say,  at  least  in  prose.  Some- 
body will  be  the  better  for  it ;  I  do  not  mean 
you  but  your  Cat,  feue  Mademoiselle  Selime, 
whom  1  am  about  to  immortalize  for  one  week 
or  fortnight,  as  follows  : — 

[Here  followed  the  Ode.]    ' 

There's  a  poem  for  you,  it  is  rather  too  long 
for  an  Epitaph." 

*  Walpole  had  been  elected  a  Fellow  of  the  Royal 
Society. 

t  There  is  a  print  of  Hogarth's  with  the  title,  "The 
Mysteryof  Masonry  brought  to  light  by  the  Gormogons." 
See  Nicholl's"  Life  of  Hogarth,"  and  Pope's  "Dunciad," 
iv.  576. 


ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A  FAVOURITE  CAT.  283 

The  Ode  was  first  printed  in  1748  in  Vol.  II. 
of  Dodsley's  "  Collection  of  Poems,"  and  forms 
the  second  piece  in  the  1753  edition  of  Gray's 
"  Six  Poems  "  and  in  the  subsequent  editions. 

The  drowning  of  the  cat  took  place  in  Arling- 
ton Street ;  and,  after  the  death  of  Gray,  Wal- 
pole  placed  the  vase  on  a  pedestal  at  Strawberry 
Hill,  with  a  label  containing  the  first  stanza  of 
the  poem.  I  am  indebted  to  the  kindness  of 
Lord  Derby  for  the  information  that  the  vase 
and  pedestal  were  bought  at  the  sale  at  Straw- 
berry Hill,  in  1842,  for  £42,  by  the  grandfather 
of  the  present  Earl,  and  the  vase  is  now  in  the 
picture  gallery  at  Lord  Derby's  seat  at  Knows- 

ley. 

1-6.  The  exordium  of  this  mock-heroic  is  in 
imitation  of  the  opening  lines  of  Dryden's 
"  Alexander's  Feast "  : — 

"  'Twas  at  the  royal  feast  for  Persia  won 
By  Philip's  warlike  son ; 
Aloft  in  awful  state 
The  godlike  hero  sat 
On  his  imperial  throne." 

WTiere  China's,  etc.  "  On  which  China  vase 
the  full-blown  flowers  had  been  painted  in  blue." 
Azure  is  derived  from  the  Persian  lajaward^ 
through  the  Arabic  azr-aq,  in  which  the  I  is 
dropped,  the  lapis  lazuli.  Cf.  Lady  M.  W. 
Montagu's  "  Town  Eclogues  "  :— 


284  NOTES. 

"  Where  the  tall  jar  erects  its  stately  pride, 
With  antic  shapes  in  China's  azure  dyed." 

flowers^  that  hlow.  Exception  was  taken  by 
Dr.  Johnson  to  the  redundancy  of  "  that  blow," 
but  not  only  is  redundancy  of  the  kind  poetical, 
but  here  tlie  expression  requires  no  such  de- 
fence— "  tliat  blow"="  that  are  blowing  on 
it,"  so  that  we,  as  it  were,  see  the  flowers  in 
full  blow.  The  same  expression  occurs  in  the 
"  Progress  of  Poesy,"  line  5,  where  also  it  is 
not  redundant. 

When  first  published,  the  last  three  lines  of 
this  stanza  stood  : 

"  The  pensive  Selima  reclined, 
Demurest  of  the  tabby  kind, 
Gazed  on  the  lake  below." 

The  punctuation  was  then  correct,  but  in  the 
next  edition  Gray  transposed  lines  four  and 
five  as  tkey  now  stand,  and  retained  the  comma 
after  reclined,  thus  separating  the  subject 
{Selima)  from  its  verb  by  one  comma.  Stephen 
Jones  was  the  first  (1799)  to  correct  the 
punctuation  by  putting  a  comma  after  Selima 
also. 

Tabby.  Walpole  had  two  cats,  and  seems 
to  have  written  to  Gray  that "  his  handsome 
cat  was  dead."  Gray  wrote  the  Ode,  not 
knowing  which  cat    it  was,  but  (as  he  says 


ODE  ON  THE  DEATH  OF  A  FAVOURITE  CAT.  285 

in  the  letter  in  -whicli  he  sent  the  Ode)  he  did 
not  wish  to  appear  not  to  know  which  cat  was 
dead,  so  he  would  imagine  "  it  must  be  the 
tabby  one."  A  tabby  cat  is  one  whose  coat  is 
brindled,  black  and  grey,  like  the  waves  of 
watered  silk.  Tahhy  is  from  Fr.  talis,  watered 
silk,  from  Arabic  attabi,  a  part  of  Bagdad, 
where  it  was  made. 

From  line  10  Mr.  Gosse  argues  "  she  cannot 
have  been  a  tabby,"  but  a  tortoise-shell  cat ; 
and  is  followed  by  other  annotators.  Mr. 
Storr,  in  his  note  on  line  4,  says,  "  Prove  that 
she  was  not  a  tabby."  But,  since  Gray  plainly 
states  he  intends  the  Ode  to  refer  to  the  tabby 
one,  why  should  we  suppose  that  just  after 
speaking  of  her  as  "  the  tabby  kind,"  he  forgot 
that,  and  now  describes  her  as  a  tortoise-shell  cat 
because  he  says  her  coat  vied  with  the  tortoise  ? 
Walpole's  other  cat  may  have  been  a  tortoise- 
shell,  and  therefore  Gray  would  describe  this — 
the  handsome  one — as  vying  with  her  in  beauty, 
and  purring  with  pleasure  at  the  sight  of  it. 
Or  it  may  be  he  wrote  so  as  to  be  right  which- 
ever cat  it  was ;  if  we  take  "  tabby  kind  "  as 
equivalent  to  "cat-kind,"  the  Ode  will  be 
applicable  to  a  tortoise-shell  cat. 

31-36.  See  the  Explanation  of  the  Designs 
in  the  edition  ot  1753,  quoted  after  the  Notes, 
infra. 


286  NOTES. 

37-42.  Nor  all,  that  glisters,  gold.  Like 
many  another  phrase  or  saying  adopted  by 
Gray,  this  has  been  given  greater  currency  from 
being  in  his  oft-read  poems.  It  occurs  in  several 
old  poets  before  Gray  : 

**  But  all  which  shineth  as  the  gold 
Ne  is  no  gold,  as  I  have  been  it  told." 

— Chaucer,  Yeman's  Tale, 

Mitford  quotes  it  from  the  "  Paradise  of 
Dainty  Devices,"  "  England's  Helicon,"  the 
"  Faerie  Queene,"  etc.  It  also  occurs  in  Shake- 
speare and  Dryden : — 

"  All  that  glisters  is  not  gold." 

— Tlie  Merchant  of  Venice,  ii.  7. 

"  All,  as  they  say,  that  glitters  is  not  gold." 

— Hind  and  Panther. 

Various  Readings. 

14.  In  the  Pembroke  and  Walpole  MSS.  and 
in  the  1748  "  Collection,"  Two  beauteous  forms. 

24.  In  the  "  Collection  "  of  1748,  A  foe  to  fish. 

25.  Looks — in  the  Wharton  MS.,  eyes ;  in  the 
Pembroke,  eye. 

35.  In  the  Walpole  and  Wharton  MSS.  and 
in  the  "  Collection  "  of  1748,  nor  Harry  heard. 

36.  In  the  Walpole  MS.  and  in  the  "  Collec- 
tion" of  1748,  What  favourite  has  a  friend  ! 

40.  Tempts.  Pembroke  and  Wharton  MSS., 
strikes. 


ODE  ON  ETON  COLLEGE.  287 

III.— ODE   ON   A  DISTANT   PROSPECT 
OF  ETON  COLLEGE. 

In  Gray's  MS.  at  Pembroke  College,  the 
title  is, "  Ode  on  a  Distant  Prospect  of  Windsor, 
and  the  adjacent  Country."  *  At  the  foot  Gray 
has  written  :— "  At  Stoke,  Aug.,  1742." 

Though  written  in  1742,Gray  didnot  publish 
this  Ode  till  1747,  and  it  was  the  first  of  his 
English  productions  which  appeared  in  print. 
It  was  published  anonymously,  in  a  folio  pam- 
phlet of  eight  pages,  as  "  An  Ode  on  a  Distant 
Prospect  of  Eton  College.  London.  Printed 
for  R.  Dodsley  at  Tully's  Head  in  Pall  Mall ; 
and  sold  by  M.  Cooper  at  the  Globe  in  Pater- 
noster Row,  1747.     (Price  Sixpence.) " 

It  appeared,  still  without  his  name,  in  Yol. 
II.  of  Dodsley's  "  Collection  of  Poems  "  in  1748 ; 
and  comes  third  in  the  "  Six  Poems  "  of  1753. 

The  motto  from  Menander  and  the  notes 
were  first  printed  in  1768.  In  the  Pembroke 
MS.  the  motto  is  written  in  Gray's  hand  along 
the  margin  commencing  opposite  the  middle  of 
the  sixth  stanza ;  and  is  as  it  were  in  ex- 
planation of  the  line — 

"  Ah,  tell  them,  they  are  men  ! " 

The  passage  in  Menander  from  which  the  mot- 

*  The  title  is  incorrectly  given  by  Mr.  Gosse. 


288  NOTES. 

to  is  taken  being  in  reply  to  the  query,  "  Why 
are  you  miserable  ?  "  several  reasons  are  given 
ending  with  '"Avdpwno'i  etc.,  "Because  I  am  a 
man^ — a  sufficient  excuse  for  being  miserable." 

1-10.  Antique.  Ancient;  "  antique  "  is  now 
applied  to  old-fashioned  things,  and  would  not 
be  used  of  a  building.  Milton  spells  it  antic^ 
and  probably  Gray  took  the  epithet  from  the 
line  in  "II  Penseroso  "  :-"  With  antic  pillars 
massy  proof." 

12-20.  Beloved  in  vain.  Because  they  do 
not  still  afford  him  the  sensations  he  had  as  a 
"  careless  "  boy ;  there  is  also  a  reference  to  the 
recent  death  of  his  school  friend,  "West. 

21-30.  With  the  apostrophe  to  Father  Thames 
and  what  follows  compare  the  following  lines 
from  Green's  "  Grotto,"  the  poem  Gray  said  he 
had  in  mind  when  writing  the  "  Ode  on  the 
Spring"  : — 

''Say,  Father  Thames,  whose  gentle  pace 
Gives  leave  to  view  what  beauties  grace 
Your  flowery  banks,  if  you  have  seen 
The  much-sung  grotto  of  the  Queen." 

29.  In  the  Pembroke  MS.  this  line  runs : — 

"  To  chase  the  hoop's  elusive  speed." 

This  curious  expression  occurs  in  the  frag- 
ment of  a  tragedy,  "  Agrippina,"  which  Gray 
had  written  a  few  months  previously  in  1742:- 


ODE  ON  ETON  COLLEGE.  289 

"  we  could  not  have  beguiled 
With  more  elusive  speed  the  dazzled  sight 
Of  wakeful  jealousy." 


55-59.  all.  Completely;  an  adverb,  ^em. 
This  abbreviation  of  them,^  or  perhaps  a  sur- 
vival of  the  O.E.  eom,  is  now  a  vulgarism  or 
only  used  colloquiall}',  but  Gray  printed  it  thus 
to  avoid  the  unmusical  sound  of  the  d  and  th  ; 
and  he  has  it  in  "  Agrippina  "  : — "  He  perchance 
may  heed  'em." 

MurtKrous.  Murder  was  formerly  also 
spelt  murther^  d  and  th  being  in  many  words 
interchangeable,  e.  g.  burden,  burthen,  thrill, 
drill.  Murtherous  is  a  very  expressive  form, 
and  suits  the  rhythm  of  the  line  better ;  he 
uses  it  again  in  the  "  Ode  for  Music,"  46. 

In  the  Pembroke  MS.  it  is  "  griesly,"  and 
"  murtherous  "  is  entered  in  the  margin. 

92.  alike  goes  with  condemned,  "  all  equally 
condemned."  Lines  96  and  97  should  be  taken 
with  95  : — "  Since  sorrow  never  comes  too 
late,  and  happiness  too  swiftly  dies,  why  should 
they  know  their  fate  ? "  The  punctuation  here 
is  correct,  as  would  also  be  a  comma  after /a^e 
and  a  query  'dliQv  flies  ;  but  some  editors  have 
a  comma  after  flies. 

Sir  H.  Wotton,  Provost  of  Eton,  the  sum- 
mer before  his  death  visited  Winchester  Col- 


290  NOTES. 

lege  where  he  had  been  educated,  and  when  he 
was  returning  to  Eton,  he  made  the  following 
reflections,  as  given  in  his  Life  by  Isaac  Wal- 
ton : — "  How  useful  was  the  advice  of  a  holy 
monk,  who  persuaded  his  friend  to  perform  his 
customary  devotions  in  a  constant  place,  be- 
cause in  that  place  we  usually  meet  with  those 
very  thoughts  which  possessed  us  at  our  last 
being  there ;  and  I  find  it  thus  far  experiment- 
ally true,  that  at  now  being  in  that  school,  and 
seeing  that  very  place,  where  I  sat  when  I  was 
a  bo}^,  occasioned  me  to  remember  those  very 
thoughts  of  my  youth  which  then  possessed 
me ;  sweet  thoughts  indeed,  that  promised  my 
growing  years  numerous  pleasures  without 
mixture  of  cares,  and  those  to  be  enjoyed  when 
time  (which  I  thereof  thought  slow-paced) 
had  changed  my  youth  into  manhood.  But 
age  and  experience  have  taught  me  that  these 
were  but  empty  hopes ;  for  I  now  always  found 
it  true,  as  my  Saviour  did  foretell,  '  SuflScient 
unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof.'  Neverthe- 
less, I  saw  there  a  succession  of  boys  using  the 
same  recreations,  and  questionless  possessed 
with  the  same  thoughts  that  then  possessed 
me.  Thus  one  generation  succeeds  another 
in  their  lives,  recreations,  hopes,  fears,  and 
death." 
A  correspondent  of  the  "  Gentleman's  Mag- 


HYMN  TO  ADVERSITY.  291 

azine,"  June,  1798,  considers  that  this  passage 
may  have  "  occasioned "  Gray's  writing  the 
«  Ode  on  Eton." 


lY.— HYMN  TO  ADVERSITY. 

In  the  MS.  of  this  poem  at  Pembroke  Col- 
lege the  heading  is — "  Ode.  To  Adversity," 
and  at  the  foot  Gray  has  written  "  At  Stoke, 
Aug.  1742." 

It  was  first  printed  in  the  edition  of  1753 
as  the  fifth  of  the  "  Six  Poems,"  and  next  ap- 
peared in  1755  in  Vol.  IV.  of  Dodsley's  "  Collec- 
tion of  Poems  by  Several  Hands."  In  both 
places,  and  in  Gray's  edition  of  1768,  it  is  called 
"  Hymn  to  Adversity,"  "  which  title  "  Mason 
"  dropped  for  the  sake  of  uniformity  in  the 
page  ; "  as  he  numbers  the  first  eleven  pieces 
in  his  edition  of  1775  Ode  L,  II.,  etc. ;  and 
several  editors  have  followed  him  in  calling  it 
"  Ode  to  Adversity."  Mason  and  others  after 
him  are  also  wrong  in  stating  that  the  poem  first 
appeared  in  Dodsley's  "  Collection  "  ; — only 
three  volumes  were  published  at  first  (1748),  and 
in  1755  a  second  edition  of  these  was  issued,  with 
a  fourth  volume,  which  opened  with  the 
"  Elegy,"  and  the  "  Hymn  to  Adversity,"  "  by 
the  Same,"  was  the  next  in  the  "  Collection ;" 


292  NOTES. 

in  1758  the  four  volumes  were  reprinted,  with 
a  fifth  and  sixth,  Gray's  "  Pindaric  Odes  "  being 
the  last  two  pieces  in  Vol.  VL* 

The  motto  from  ^schylus  first  appeared  in 
the  edition  of  1768.  In  the  Pembroke  MS. 
Gray  adds  a  second  (printed  only  in  Lacking- 
ton's  edition,  1788) :— 

Sv/i(j)ipet 

lu^povelv  vnb  arevei  (sic) — Id.  Eumenid.  523. 

(It  profits  to  learn  discretion  through  suf- 
fering.) 

1-8.  In  three  places  in  this  stanza  Gray  bor- 
rows from  "  Paradise  Lost " — 

"The  vassals  of  his  anger,  when  the  scourge 
Inexorably,  and  the  torturing  hour, 
Calls  us  to  penance." — ii.  90-92. 

"  In  adamantine  chains  and  penal  fire." — i.  48. 

**  Strange  horror  seize  thee,  and  pangs  unfelt  before." 

— ii.  703. 

Adamantine  chains  occurs  in  ^schylus, 
Horace,  and  several  English  poets. 

8.  In  the  Pembroke  MS.  he  first  wrote  "  and 
Misery  not  their  own  ; "  a  line  is  drawn  through 

*  From  Mitf ord's  reference  to  the  pages  of  the  edition 
of  1755,  and  other  allusions  in  his  notes,  it  would  seem 
that  he  was  not  aware  that  the  first  three  volumes  were 
published  in  1748,  and  he  misplaces  Gray's  letter  criticis- 
ing some  of  the  poems  when  the  "  Collection "  first 
appeared. 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  293 

these  words  and  "  unpitied  and  alone  "  written 
above. 

27.  Almost  all  editors  have  a  comma  after 
maid,  but  there  is  none  in  any  of  the  editions 
of  this  Ode  printed  in  Gray's  lifetime. 

32.  In  the  margin  of  the  Pembroke  MS. 
Gray  has  written  opposite  this  line,  «  y>.oxu- 
Saxph^."  "  I  imagine  "  (writes  Mr.  Tovey  to  me) 
"  he  has  transferred  this  epithet  to  pity  from 
Meleager's  xripvaaio  rdv  'EpcjTa,  where  the  line 
descriptive  of  Love  runs — 

36.  Mitford,  Palgrave,  Gosse,  "Ward,  Rolfe 
and  others  wrongly  read  "  Not "  for  "  Nor," 
and  have  a  full  stop  at  end  of  line  44. 

43.  philosoj^hic  train.  Your  followers  who 
are  of  a  "  philosophic  mind,"  and  have  learned 
that  "  sweet  are  the  uses  of  adversity."  See 
the  train  named  in  "II  Penseroso,"  45-55. 

45-47.  There  is  probably  an  allusion  here  to 
"Walpole's  disagreement  Avith  Gray,  on  their 
travels  a  year  previously,  and  Gray's  regret  for 
it. 


Y.— THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY. 

This  Ode  was  written  at  Cambridge  in  1754, 
and  in  a  letter  dated  26th  December,  Gray 


22— a  &  G— AA 


294  NOTES. 

sent  as  an  "  Ode  in  the  Greek  manner  "  to  Dr. 
Wharton,  observing  "  If  this  be  as  tedious  to 
you  as  it  is  grown  to  me,  I  shall  be  sorry  that 
I  sent  it  to  you." 

In  1757  it  was  printed  along  with  the  "  Bard," 
but  neither  with  their  present  title,  but  merely 
Ode  I.  and  Ode  II.  The  little  quarto  volume 
of  twenty -one  pages  was  published  on  the  8th 
of  August — the  first  issue  of  Horace  Walpole's 
printing  press — with  an  engraving  of  Straw- 
berry Hill,  and  the  following  title  : — "  Odes  by 
Mr.  Gray.  <PmvavTa  awsro'Kn. — Pindar,  Olymp. 
II.  Printed  at  Strawberry  Hill,  for  R.  and  J. 
Dodsley  in  Pali  Mall,  mdcclvii.  (Price  One 
Shilling.)" 

There  were  no  notes  in  the  edition  of  1757, 
but  they  were  supplied  by  Gray  in  the  edition 
of  1768,  who  apologized  for  so  doing  thus : — 
"  Advertisement. — When  the  Author  first  pub- 
lished  this  and  the  following  Ode,  he  was 
advised,  even  by  his  Friends,  to  subjoin  some  ex- 
planatory Notes,  but  had  too  much  respect  for 
the  understanding  of  his  Readers  to  take  that 
liberty." 

Before  reading  the  Poem  it  would  be  well 
for  the  student  to  read  the  commentary  Gray 
gives  in  his  notes,  which  is  virtually  an  analysis 
of  the  Ode, 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  295 

1.  Gray  quotes  (incorrectly)  from  the  Prayer 
Book  version  of  Psalm  Ivii.  9.  jEolian  lyre. 
This  is  equiva'lent  to  "  lyre  of  Pindar."  ^olia 
extended  along  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor  from 
the  Troad  to  the  Hermus.  Alcaeus  and  Sappho 
belonged  to  Lesbos,  an  island  of  the  ^.olians, 
and  hence  one  of  the  chief  Greek  rhythms  was 
called  ^olian.  Cf.  the  following  lines  from 
Milton,  "  Paradise  Kegained,"  iv.  254  : — 

"  There  thou  shalt  hear  and  learn  the  secret  power 
Of  harmony,  in  tones  and  numbers  hit 
By  voice  or  hand,  and  various-measvired  verse, 
^olian  charms  and  Dorian  lyric  odes." 

In  a  letter  to  Wharton,  dated  October  7, 
1757,  Gray  says  :— "  The  '  Critical  Review '  .  .  . 
is  in  raptures,  but  mistakes  the  ^olian  lyre 
for  the  harp  of  ^olus,  and  on  this  pleasant 
error  founds  both  a  compliment  and  a  criticism." 
In  spite  of  this  and  Gray's  footnote  a  recent  an- 
notator  has  repeated  the  wrong  interpretation, 

13.  theioilling  soul.  Cf.  Milton's  "  Vacation 
Exercise,"  50-52  :— 

"  While  sad  Ulysses'  soul  and  all  the  rest 
Are  held  with  his  melodious  harmony 
In  loilling  chains  and  sweet  captivity." 

14.  solemn-lreatUng.  This  compound  is 
taken  from  Milton  ;  the  whole  passage  in  which 
the  following  lines  occur  should  be  read  :— 


296  NOTES. 

"  At  last  a  soft  and  solemn-breathing  sound 
Rose  like  a  stream  of  rich  distilled  perfumes." 

— Comus,  555. 

20-21.  ihefeathered  king,  the  eagle,  the  "  bird 
of  Jove,"  "  Par.  Lost,"  xi.  185.  This  expression 
occurs  in  verses  attributed  to  Shakespeare  : — 

"  Every  fowl  of  tyrant  wing, 
Save  the  eagle, /eaf/jered  king.''' 

22.  flagging  wing.  Horace  Walpole,  in  de- 
scribing the  famous  Boccapadugli  eagle,  of 
Greek  sculpture,  says  "  Mr.  Gray  has  drawn  the 
flagging  loing.'''' 

27.  Idalia.  Idalium,  in  Cyprus,  where  there 
was  a  temple  sacred  to  the  worship  of  Yenus. 
She  was  also  called  Cytherea,  from  Cythera,  an 
island  off  the  coast  of  Laconia,  where  she  was 
said  to  have  landed  when  she  rose  from  the 
foam  of  the  sea.  velvet  green.  The  green  grass- 
plot  as  soft  as  velvet,  green,  is  a  noun,  and  velvet, 
an  adj.  Gray  prints  velvet-green,  and  has  sev- 
eral similar  compounds,  e.  g.,  "  desert-beach," 
"  Fatal  Sisters,"  37.  Dr.  Johnson  objected  to 
the  use  of  velvet,  on  the  ground  that  Nature 
should  not  borrow  from  Art ;  but  Gray  follows 
Shakespeare  and  other  poets  : — 

"Make  boot  upon  the  summer's  velvet  buds." 

Henry  V.  i  2. 

81.  frolic  is  here  an  adjective,  as  also  in  the 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  297 

two  places  it  occurs  in  Milton,  "  Comus,"  59, 
and  "  I'Allegro,"  18  :— 

"  The  frolic  wind  that  breathes  the  spring." 

And  Tennyson  has  "  with  a  frolic  welcome  " 
in  "  Ulysses." 

36.  many-twinJclmg.  An  incorrectly  formed 
compound ;  but  it  occurs  in  Thomson's  "  Spring  " 
(1728)  :— 

"  Or  rustling  turn  the  viany-tvnnkling  leaves 

Of  aspen  tall." 

39.  wins  her  way.  The  phrase  is  in  "  Para- 
dise Lost,"  ii.  1016  : — 

"...  on  all  sides  round 
Environed,  vpins  his  vs^ay." 

51.  He  gives.  He  permits ;  a  Latinism.  See 
«  Ode  for  Music,"  16. 

Mitford  noted  that "  the  couplet  from  Cowley 
was  wrongly  quoted  by  Gray,  and  so  continued 
by  his  different  editors  ; "  but  be  himself  did 
not  give  the  lines  correctly.     They  are : — 

«'  One  would  have  thought  't  had  heard  the  Morning 
crow, 
Or  seen  her  well-appointed  Star 
Come  marching  up  the'Eastern  Hill  afar." 

— Brutus,  an  Ode. 

Gray  was  fond  of  reproducing  a  word  or  phrase 
that  pleased  him  ;  in  his  Journal  of  his  tour  in 
the  Lake  District  he  writes  under  Oct.    4, 


298  NOTES. 

1769  : — '  While  I  was  here  a  little  shower  fell, 
red  clouds  came  marching  up  the  hills  from  the 
east,  a  part  of  a  bright  rainbow  seemed  to  rise 
along  the  side  of  Castle-hill." 

53.  S2)y.  See,  espy  ;  without  the  idea  of  se- 
crecy now  always  attaching  to  it ;  see  "  Paradise 
Lost,"  iv.  1005.  of  war.  Equivalent  to  "  of 
armed  men  in  battle  array  ;  "  the  rays  of  the  sun 
being  compared  to  the  spears  and  other  shining 
weapons  of  an  army.  Mr.  Rolfe  quotes  from 
Lowell : — 

"  'Tis  frona  these  heights  alone  your  eyes 
The  advancing  spears  of  daj^  can  see, 

Which  o'er  the  eastern  hill-tops  rise, 
To  break  your  long  captivity." 

— Above  and  Below. 

In  "  Agrippina  "  Gray  has  "  the  glittering  front 
of  war."  Twice  elsewhere  he  rhymes /"«/•  with 
war : — 

"  Oft  o'er  the  trembling  nations  from  afar, 
Has  Scythia  breathed  the  living  cloud  of  war." 
— Education  and  Oovernment. 

"  When  blazing  'gainst  the  sun  it  shines  from  far, 
And,  clashed,  rebellovrs  with  the  din  of  war." 

— Translation  from  Statins. 

69.  M(2ander.  The  Maeander,  proverbial, 
for  its  wandering  course,  flowed  through  Phry- 
gia,  into  the  Icarian  Sea.  Miletus,  on  the  Mae- 
ander, was  the  birthplace  of  Thales  and  other 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  299 

Greek  philosophers  ;  but  the  reference  is  prob- 
ably  suggested  by  Milton's  lines  : — 

"Sweet  Echo,  sweetest   nymph,  that    livest  unseen, 

Within  thy  airy  shell ; 
By  slow  Maeander's  margent  green," — Comus,  230. 

"With  lines  66-72,  compare  Bryon's  : — 

"The  Isles  of  Greece,  the  Isles  of  Greece, 
Where  burning  Sappho  loved  and  sung, 
Where  grew  the  arts  of  war  and  peace. 

Where  Delos  rose  and  Phoebus  sprung  I 
Eternal  summer  gilds  them  yet, 
But  all,  except  their  Sun,  is  set." — Don  Juan. 

73,  Each  oldpoetiG  Mountain.  In  the  "  Chris- 
tian  Year  "  (third  Sunday  in  Lent)  Keble  refers 
to  these  words  in  a  note  to  his  lines  : — 

"  Fly  from  the  '  old  poetic '  fields. 
Ye  Paynim  shadows  dark  I 
Immortal  Greece,  dear  land  of  glorious  lays," 

Those  who  are  familiar  with  Gray's  letters 
will  remember  the  one  to  West,  where  he 
says  : — "  In  our  little  journey  up  to  the  Grande 
Chartreuse,  I  do  not  remember  to  have  gone  ten 
paces  without  an  exclamation  that  there  was 
no  restraining ;  not  a  precipice,  not  a  torrent, 
not  a  cliff,  but  is  pregnant  with  religion  and 
^oeivy''— November  16,  1739. 

83.  Far  from  the  sun,  etc.  In  the  more  north- 
ern clime  of  England — far  from  sunny  Italy. 


300  NOTES. 

84.  Natures  Darling.  Mitford  quotes  from 
Clevelaad : — 

"  Here  lies,  within  this  stony  shade, 
Nature's  darling,  whom  she  made 
Her  fairest  model,  her  brief  story, 
In  him  heaping  all  her  glory. " 

Nature's  Darling.  Knowledge  of  Greek  and 
Latin  being  the  recognized  learning  in  the  seven- 
teenth and  eighteenth  centuries,  and  Shake- 
speare having  little  of  it,  he  is  often  spoken  of 
as  deriving  his  knowledge  from  J^ature  ;  see  in 
particular  Ben  Jonson's  lines  "  To  the  Memory 
of  Shakespeare  :  "  — 

"  He  was  not  of  an  age  but  for  all  time  I  .  .  . 
Nature  herself  was  proud  of  his  designs.  .  .  . 
The  merry  Greek  .  ,  .  now  not  please,  .  .  . 
As  they  were  not  of  Nature's  family, 
Yet  must  I  not  give  Nature  all ;  thy  Art,"  etc. 

And  in  Milton  ("  I'Allegro,  132-134)  :— 

"  If  Jonson's  learned  sock  be  on. 

Or  sweetest  Shakespeare,  Fancy's  child. 

Warble  his  native  wood  notes  wild." 

89.  pencil.  Paint-brush  ;  an  old  use  of  the 
word,  from  Lat.  pensillum,  a  brush ;  he  has  it 
again  in  the  "  Stanzas  to  Mr.  Bentley,"  4. 

87,  88.  The  Child  stretched  forth,  etc.  Mit- 
ford quotes  from  Sandys'  Ovid,  "  Metam."  iv. 
515:— 


THE  PROGRESS  OF  POESY.  301 

" the  child 


Stretched  forth  its  little  arms,  and  on  him  smiled.'' 
91.  golden  keys.     Cf.  Milton  : — 

"  Yet  some  there  be,  that  by  due  steps  aspire 

To  lay  their  just  hands  on  that  golden  key 

That  opes  the  palace  of  eternity."— Cojwms,  12-14. 

105.  Coursers,  horses;  literally,  runners. 
There  is  an  allusion  to  the  fabulous  winged 
horse  Pegasus,  associated  with  poetic  inspira- 
tion, ethereal,  belonging  to  the  upper  air,  of 
pure  ether.  Wakefield  quotes  from  the 
"  ^neid,"  vii.  280  :— 

"  Currum,  geminosque  jugales 
Semine  ab  aethereo,  spirantes  nairbus  ignem." 

106.  Cf.  Pope,  "Epistles,"  I.  ii.  267:— 

"  Waller    was  smooth  ;   but    Dry  den  taught  to  join 
The  varying  verse,  the  full  resounding  line, 
The  long  majestic  march,  and  energy  divine." 

109.  pictured  ur7i,  with  pictures  on  it.  Cf. 
"  storied  urn,"  "  Elegy,"  41,  and  Milton's  "  Pen- 
seroso,"  "  storied  windows  richly  dight."  The 
idea  is  probably  borrowed  from  a  picture  of  a 
female  figure  scattering  gifts  from  a  jar. 

121, 122.  Yet  shall  he  mount.  In  the  last  three 
lines,  Gray  expresses  his  own  feelings  and  char- 
acter, his  pride,  and,  at  the  same  time,  his  re- 
tiring disposition,  vulgar,  ordinary,  common. 
Cf.  the  last  stanza  of  the  Ode  Gray  wrote 


302  NOTES. 

in    the    album    at    the     Grande    Chartreuse, 
p.  156. 

123.  "  Still  show  how  much  the  good  outshone 
the  greaV — Katharine  Philips. 

Manuscript  Readings. 

1.  Awake,  my  lyre  ;  my  glory,  wake. 

2.  Rapture.     Transport. 

11.  With  torrent  rapture,  see  it  pour. 
23.  Dark,  Black.     30,  Sports.     Sport. 
34.  In  cadence.     The  cadence. 
52,  53.  Till  fierce  Hyperion  from  afar 

Pours  on  their  scatter'd  rear  his  glittering 

shafts  of  war. 
Hurls  at  their  flying  rear  his  glitt'ring  shafts 

of  war. 
Hurls  o'er  their  scatter'd  rear  his  glitt'ring 

shafts  of  war. 
Hurls  o'er  their  shadowy  rear  his  glitt'ring 

shafts  of  war. 
Till  o'er  their  shadowy  rear  from  afar 
Hyperion  hurls  around  his  glitt'ring  shafts 

of  war. 
57.    Shivering.     Buried — in   the   margin    of 
the  MS.     Dull  in  the  margin  of  the  Pembroke 
MS.  ;    and  chill  in  the  text. 

76,   Murmured  a  celestial  soend. 
93.   Ho7'ror.     Terror  in  the  margin  of  the 
Pembroke  MS. 


THE  BARD.  303 

108.   Bright-eyed.     Full-plumed. 

118.  Yet  when   they  first   were  opened   on 

the  day 
Before  his  visionary  eyes  would  run. 

119.  Forms.     Shapes. 

122.  Yet  never  can  he  fear  a  vulgar  fate. 


VI.— THE  BARD. 

In  a  letter,  dated  August  6,  1755,  Gray  sent 
Dr.  Wharton  the  first  part  of  "  The  Bard/'  and 
on  the  21st  August  a  bit  more  of  the  "  Proph- 
ecy "  (from  line  57  to  the  end,  but  unfinished 
in  places).  In  May,  1757,  in  a  letter  to  Mason, 
he  states  that  Parry,  the  Welsh  harper,  had 
been  at  Cambridge,  and  his  "  ravishing  blind 
harmony "  and  "  tunes  of  a  thousand  years 
old  "  had  put  the  "  Odikle  "  in  motion  again, 
and  that  he  had  then  completed  it,  and  he  con- 
cluded his  letter  with  the  last  two  stanzas.  It 
was  printed,  as  we  have  seen,  with  "  The  Prog- 
ress of  Poesy"  at  Horace  Wal pole's  press, 
and  published  on  the  8th  August,  1757,  and 
bore  the  title  of  "  Ode  II." 

In  his  Commonplace  Book,  Gray  wrote  the 
following  as  what  he  originally  intended  to  be 
the  argument  of  the  "  Bard  "  ;  but  he  did  not 
finish  it  in  accordance  with  his  original  plan  :— 


304  NOTES. 

"  The  army  of  Edward  I.,  as  they  march 
through  a  deep  valley,  and  approach  Mount 
Snowdon,  are  suddenly  stopped  by  the  appear- 
ance of  a  venerable  figure  seated  on  the  sum- 
mit of  an  inaccessible  rock,  who,  with  a  voice 
more  than  human,  reproaches  the  king  with  all 
the  desolation  and  misery  which  he  had  brought 
on  his  country;  foretells  the  misfortunes  of 
the  Norman  race,  and  with  prophetic  spirit 
declares  that  all  his  cruelty  shall  never  ex- 
tinguish the  noble  ardour  of  poetic  genius  in 
this  island  ;  and  that  men  shall  never  be  want- 
ing to  celebrate  true  virtue  and  valour  in  im- 
mortal strains,  to  expose  vice  and  infamous 
pleasure,  and  boldly  censure  tyranny  and  op- 
pression. His  song  ended,  he  precipitates  him- 
self from  the  mountain,  and  is  swallowed  up 
by  the  river  that  rolls  at  its  foot." 

11.  shaggy.  Rough  and  uneven-looking 
owing  to  being  covered  with  trees.  Milton 
applies  the  epithet  to  hills  : — 

Nor  on  the  shaggy  top  of  Mona  high." 

— Lycidas,  54. 

*'  They  plucked  the  seated  hills  with  all  their  load — 
Rocks,  waters,  woods,  and  by  the  shaggy  tops." 

— Par.  Lost,  vi.  645. 

16.  Old  Conway's.  In  Mitford's  "  Aldine  " 
Edition  it  is  misprinted  "  cold  Conway's,"  and 
this  is  followed  in  Ward's  "  English  Poets." 


THE  BARD.  306 

28.  Hoel  is  called  high  horn^  being  the  son  of 
Owen  Gwynedd,  prince  of  North  Wales.  He 
was  one  of  his  father's  generals  in  his  wars 
against  the  English,  Flemings,  and  Normans, 
in  South  Wales  ;  and  was  a  famous  bard,  as  his 
poems  that  are  extant  testify. 

Llewellyn  was  a  French  Prince  who  was  killed 
in  the  wars  with  Edward  I,  He  was  also  a 
poet.  In  contemporary  poets  he  is  described  as 
the  "  tender-hearted  "  and  "  mild  "  Llewelh' n  ; 
so  soft  should  be  taken  with  Llewellyn  and  not 
with  lay. 

29.  Cadwallo  and  JJrien  are  Welsh  bards,  but 
none  of  their  poems  are  now  extant.  See 
Southey's  "  Madoc  in  Wales." 

30.  "  Uttering  such  dulcet  and  harmonious 

breath, 
That  the  rude  sea  grew  civil  at  her  song." 
— Midsummer  Nighfs  Dremn,  ii.  2.  150. 
Modred  may  be  Myrddin,  a  disciple  of  Taliessin, 
or  a  name  invented  by  Gray. 

34.  Plinlimmon,  a  mountain  on  the  borders 
of  Cardigan  and  Glamorgan,  cloud-topped. 
Cf.  "  cloud-capt  towers,"  in  the  "  Tempest," 
iv.  1.  172.  The  lines  mean  that  even  the  lofty 
mountain  bent  to  listen  to  his  song. 

35.  Arvon.  Caernarvon,  Caer  in  Arvon,  the 
camp  in  Arvon.  they^  the  bards  who  had  been 
put  to  death. 


306  NOTES. 

49.  From  this  line  down  to  the  end  of  line 
100,  the  "  lost  companions  "  of  the  bard  "  join 
in  harmony  "  with  him,  and  then  disappear, 
and  he  continues  the  prophecy  alone.  This  is 
clearly  indicated  in  all  the  editions  published  in 
Gray's  lifetime ;  in  these  each  line  spoken  by 
the  bard  alone — 1  to  8  and  23  to  48 — begins 
with  a  single  inverted  comma,  and  there  is  one 
at  the  end  of  line  48.  Then  from  line  49  to  100 
there  are  two  inverted  commas  at  the  beginning 
of  each  line,  and  two  at  the  end  of  line  100 ; 
and,  again,  one  inverted  comma  at  each  line 
from  101  to  142,  which  also  ends  with  one.  In 
Wakefield's  edition  (1786),  and  Lackington's 
(1788),  the  marks  are  correct.  Mason  (1775) 
is  also  correct,  and  all  reprints  I  have  seen  of  his 
editions,  except  that  the  two  inverted  commas 
at  the  end  of  line  100  are  placed  within  the 
bracket.  But  in  Mitford's  edition  (1814),  the 
commas  at  the  end  of  line  100  are  omitted,  and 
in  other  respects  the  portion  of  the  poem  from 
line  23  to  142  is  printed  as  if  an  uninterrupted 
speech  by  the  bard  alone.  The  omission  of  the 
inverted  commas  at  the  end  of  line  100  obscures 
the  intention  of  the  poet,  and  in  this  Mitford 
has  been  followed  by  almost  every  subsequent 
editor  of  Gray's  "  Poems  " — Moultrie  (the  Eton 
edition) ;  Candy  (Longmans)  1868 ;  Rolfe 
(New  York),  1876;  Gosse,  1884  ;  the  Clarendon 


THE  BARD.  307 

Press ;  Hales' '  Longer  English  Poems,"  "  the 
Golden  Treasury  of  Songs  and  Lyrics,"  and 
Ward's  "  English  Poets." 

Berkeley  Castle  is  on  the  south-east  side  of 
the  town  of  Berkeley.  Mitford  incorrectly 
reads  "  Berkeley's  roofP  Mitford  quotes  Dray- 
ton, "  Barons'  Wars  "  : — 

"  Berkley,  whose  fair  seat  hath  been  famous  long. 
Let  thy  sad  echoes  shriek  a  deadly  sound 

To  the  vast  air  ;  complain  his  grievous  wrong, 
And  keep  the  blood  that  issued  from  his  wound." 

56.  For  the  events  of  Edward  the  Second's 
reign,  the  faithlessness  of  his  wife,  Isabella  of 
France,  the  treason  of  Mortimer,  and  the 
cruel  death  of  the  king,  read  the  "  Student's 
Hume,"  chap,  ix.,  or  Green's  "  Short  History." 

agonizing  King.  The  expression  seems  to 
have  been  taken  from  Hume's  description  : 
"  The  screams  with  which  the  agonizing  king 
filled  the  castle."  The  first  volume  of  Hume's 
"  History "  was  published  in  1754,  and  it  is 
therefore  probable  that  Gray  had  just  been 
reading  it.  agonizing.  Suffering  agony  ;  more 
commonly  used  as  a  transitive  verb  : 

"  The  lifted  axe,  the  agonizing  wheel. 

— Goldsmith's  Traveller,  435. 

69.  There  is  a  note  of  interrogation  at  this 
line,  and  the  question  may  be  supplied  thus; 


308  NOTES. 

"  The  Swarm  that  were  born  in  thy  noon-tide 
beam,  where  are  they  ?  "  or  "  are  they  fled  ? " 
The  next  line  answers  "  They  are  gone,"  etc. 
The  swarm,  etc.  He  has  the  same  metaphors 
in  "  Agrippina  "  : — 

"  The  gilded  swarm  that  wantons  in  the  sunshine 
Of  thy  full  favour." 

71.  Fair  laughs  the  Morn,  etc.  These  lines 
may  be  paraphrased  thus  : — The  morning  {i.  e., 
the  early  years  of  Richard's  reign)  is  magnifi- 
cent, and  softly  the  west  wind  (flattery  of 
courtiers)  blows,  as  the  vessel  (with  the  gay 
king  and  his  friends),  decked  in  all  its  grand- 
eur, rides  proudly  on  the  sea  of  life,  with 
youth  to  point  the  w^ay  and  pleasure  to  steer 
the  course.  No  thought  is  there  of  the  whirl- 
wind that  lies  silently  in  wait  to  sweep  away 
the  prey  which  at  sunset  must  be  his. 

In  his  "  Biographia  Literaria "  (p.  9)  Cole- 
ridge states  his  preference  for  the  simile  in 
Shakespeare  : — 

"  How  like  a  younger,  or  a  prodigal, 
The  scarfed  bark  puts  from  her  native  bay, 
Hugged  and  embraced  by  the  strumpet  wind  I 
How  like  a  prodigal  doth  she  return, 
With  over-weathered  ribs,  and  ragged  sails. 
Lean,  rent,  and  beggared  by  the  strumpet  wind  I  " 

— Merchant  of  Venice,  ii.  6.  14. 

"  I  preferred,"  he  says,  "  the  original,  on  the 


THE  BARD.  309 

ground  that,  in  the  imitation,  it  depended 
wholly  on  the  compositor's  putting  or  not  put- 
ting a  small  capital  both  in  this  and  many  other 
passages  of  the  same  poet,  whether  the  words 
should  be  personifications  or  mere  abstracts. 
I  mention  this  because  in  referring  various  lines 
in  Gray  to  their  original  in  Shakespeare  and 
Milton — and  in  the  clear  perception  how  com- 
pletely all  the  propriety  w^as  lost  in  the  transfer 
^I  was,  at  that  early  period,  led  to  a  conjecture 
which,  many  years  afterwards,  was  recalled  to 
me  from  the  same  thought  having  been  started 
in  conversation,  but  far  more  ably  and  devel- 
oped more  fully,  by  Mr.  "Wordsworth,  namely, 
that  this  style  of  poetry,  which  I  have  charac- 
terized above  as  translations  of  prose  thoughts 
into  poetic  language,  had  been  kept  up,  if  it 
did  not  wholly  arise  from,  the  custom  of 
writing  Latin  verses,  and  the  great  impor- 
tance attached  to  these  exercises  in  our  public 
schools."  He  also  observes  that  the  words 
"  realm "  and  "  sway  "  are  rhymes  dearly 
purchased. 

75.    Cf.    in    his  "Education    and    Govern- 
ment "  : — 

"  And  where  the  deluge  burst  with  sweepy  sway." — 48. 

The  expression  is  from  Dryden's  translation 
of  Virgil : — 


310  NOTES. 

"  And  rolling  onwards  with  a  sweepy  sioay." 

— Oeorgics,  i.  483. 

91-94.  Above  and  below  in  the  loom  we  in- 
tertwine the  roses,  to  be  united  by  the  marriage 
of  Henry  VII.  of  Lancaster  and  Elizabeth  of 
York  ;  under  the  shade  of  which  (union  of  rose 
trees)  Richard  wallows  in  the  blood  of  the  slain 
princess.  He  is  represented  as  guilty  of  their 
murder,  and  is  under  the  shade  of  the  united 
roses,  having  been  slain  at  the  battle  of  Bos- 
worth. 

99.  Half  of  thy  heart.  Cf.  Horace's  "  animae 
dimidium  meae,"  "  Ode "  I.  3.  Tennyson 
alludes  to  the  story  of  Eleanor's  devotion  to 
her  husband  in  his  "  Dream  of  Fair  Women  "  :— 

"  Or  her  who  knew  that  love  can  vanquish  death, 
Who  kneeling  with  one  arm  about  her  king 

Drew  forth  the  poison  with  her  balmy  breath, 
Sweet  as  in  new  buds  in  spring." 

105,  106.  "  Scenes  unroll  their  skirts "  is  a 
peculiar  poetic  imagery,  A  skirt  is  the  edge 
or  lower  part  of  a  garment ;  cf.  "  outskirts." 
Gray  had  in  mind  Milton's  use  of  skirt ;  he 
applies  it  to  the  outer  edging  of  mists  and 
exhalations — 

"  Till  the  sun  rise  to  deck  your  fleecy  skirts 
with  gold."— Par.  Lost,  v.  187. 

to  the  edge  of  the  horizon — 


THE  BARD.  31I 

"  From  skirt  to  skirt  a  fiery  region." — vi.  80. 

to  the  distant  appearance  of  God's  glory — 

"  Dark  with  excessive  bright  thy  skirts  appear. 

— iii.  380. 

"Gladly  behold  though  but  his  upmost  skirts 
Of  glory,"— xi.  332. 

107.  Visions  of  glory .  Webster,  the  Ameri- 
can orator,  introduced  this  passage  thus,  "  Un- 
born ages  and  visions  of  glory  crowd  upon  my 
soul !  "  with  fine  effect  in  an  eloquent  passage 
in  an  historical  address  on  the  anniversary  of 
Washington's  birth,  23rd  February,  1852. 

108.  unborn  age  occurs  in  the  "  Ode  at  the 
Installation." 

109-110.  No  more.  .  .  All  hail,  ye  genuine 
Kings.  None  of  the  annotators  have  noted  the 
point  in  this  couplet  and  in  the  remainder  of 
the  bard's  song,  though  Gray  hints  at  it  in  his 
note  on  line  110.  Hitherto  the  bard  has  been 
denouncing  the  woes  that  were  to  befall  the 
Plantagenet  line,  but  on  the  extinction  of  the 
House  of  York  he  foresees  visions  of  glory  for 
his  native  land — not  only  was  England  to  be- 
come a  Welsh  dependency,  ruled  by  Welsh 
monarchs,  but  the  race  of  the  bards,  that  had 
been  cut  off  by  the  ruthless  Edward,  is  restored 
in  Spencer  and  Shakespeare — a  new  era  of 
bards  under  a  sovereign  of  Welsh  descent ! 


312 


NOTES. 


110,  116.  Britannia's  issue  di\idi  of  the  Briton- 
Line,  are  equivalent  to  "  Welsh  "  the  Kelts, 
original  Britons,  having  been  driven  into 
Wales  genuine.  Native  ;  lit.  "  born,"  proceed- 
ing from  the  original  stock.  He  has  it  in  the 
same  sense  in  "  Agrippina  "  : — 

"...  who  boast  the  genuine  blood 
Of  our  imperial  house." 

115-118.  Elizabeth.  Of  the  Briton- Line,  i.e., 
of  the  Welsh  line,  her  grandfather  Henry  VII. 
being  the  grandson  of  Ov^en  Tudor,  himself  a 
Welsh  chief,  and  a  descendant  of  the  ancient 
princes  of  that  country. 

123.  soaring  as  she  sings.  Mitford  refers  to 
Congreve's  "  Ode  to  Lord  Godolphin  " : — 

"  And  soars  with  rapture  while  she  sings." 

Shelley  in  his  "  Ode  to  a  Skylark  "  has  given 
a  new  turn  to  the  words : — 

"  And  singing  still  dost  soar,  and  soaring  ever  singest." 

133.  warhlings.  Warhle  is  a  favourite  word 
of  Gray's  for  song  or  verse — whether  of  birds 
or  poets.  Of.  "  Ode  on  Spring,"  5, "  Progress 
of  Poesy,"  26.  He  seems  to  have  taken  it  like 
many  another  word  or  phrase  from  Milton ;  in 
"  1' Allegro  "  Shakespeare  is  said  to 

"  Warole  his  native  wood-notes  wild." 


THE   BARD  313 

Warble  or  warbling  occurs  fourteen  times  in 
Milton,  applied  to  birds,  rivers,  and  the  human 
voice. 

137.  repairs,  etc.  This  seems  borrowed  from 
Milton : — 

"So  sinks  the  daystar  in  the  ocean-bed, 
And  yet  anon  repairs  his  drooping  head." 

Lycidas,  168. 

the  golden  flood.     The  bright  beams  of  light. 

With  joy  .  .  .  our  Fates,  etc.  The  Bard  is 
still  addressing  Edward,  and  says  he  rejoices  at 
the  different  doom  that  awaits  the  king  and 
himself — the  evil  that  is  to  fall  on  the  house  of 
the  monarch  and  his  descendants  and  the 
triumph  of  his  own  poetical  descendants  in  the 
persons  of  the  Elizabethan  poets. 

Manuscript  Readings.* 

63.  Victor.     Conqueror. 

64.  His.  The. 

65.  iV^o  .  .  .  .  no.     What  ....  what. 

69.  Hovered  in  the  noontide  ray. 

70.  Morn.     Day. 

71 — 76.   Mirrors  of  Saxon  truth  and  loyalty 
Your  helpless,  old,  expiring  master 
view ! 

*  These  "readings"  are  what  Gray  wrote  originally,  but 
struck  out,  writing  above  them,  or  in  the  margin,  what  he 
finally  approved  of. 


314  NOTES. 

Thej  hear  not ;  scarce  religion  dares 
supply 

Her  muttered  requiems,  and  her  holy- 
dew, 
■    Yet  thou,  proud  boy,  from  Pomfret's 
walls  shall  send 

A  sigh,  and  envy  oft  thy  happy  grand- 
sire's  end. 

82.  A  hateful  smile.     A  smile  of  horror. 

87.    Ye.     Grim. 

90.  Holy.     Hallowed. 

101.  Thus.     Here. 

102.  Me  unhlessedy  tmpitied,  here.     Your  de- 
spairing Caradoc.     103.     Track.     Clouds. 

104.  Melt.     Sink. 

105.  Solemn  scenes.     Scenes  of  heaven. 

106.  Glittering.     Golden. 

109.  No  more  our  long  lost,  etc- 

From  Cambria's  thousand  hills  a  thousand  strains 
Triumphant  tell  aloud,  another  Arthur  reigns. 

Ill,  112.     Youthful  knights,  and  barons  bold 
With  dazzling  helm,  and  horrent  spearo 

117.  Her  .  .  .  her.  A  .  .  .  .  an. 


THE  FATAL  SISTERS.  315 


VII.— THE  FATAL  SISTERS. 

This  Ode  was  written  in  1761,  and  first  pub- 
lished as  the  seventh  in  the  Poems  of  1768.  In 
a  letter  to  Beattie,  1st  February,  1768,  Gray 
states  that  his  "  sole  reason  "  for  publishing  this 
and  the  following  odes  is  "  to  make  up  for  the 
omission  of  the  Long  Story,"  which  he  did  not 
include  in  his  poems  in  1768. 

The  Ode  is  a  translation  or  paraphrase  from 
the  Norwegian,  the  original  being  an  Icelandic 
court  poem  written  about  1029,  entitled 
"  Darradar  Liod,  or  the  Lay  of  Darts."  It 
refers  to  the  battle  of  Clontarf,  fought  on  Good 
Friday,  1014,  and  represents  the  Weird  Sisters 
as  appearing  before  the  battle  and  weaving  the 
web  of  the  fate  of  the  King.  There  is  also  a 
Latin  version    referred  to  by  Gray. 

The  friend  referred  to  in  tlie  advertisement 
was  Mason,  and  the  "  design  was  dropped  "  on 
his  hearing  that  Thomas  Warton  was  engaged 
on  a  History  of  English  Poetry.  Warton 
(1728-1790)  was  Professor  of  Poetry  at  Oxford, 
and  succeeded  Whitehead  as  Poet-Laureate ; 
his  "  History  of  English  Poetry  "  was  not  pub- 
lished till  1774-78-81. 

The  title  in  the  Pembroke  MS.  is  "  The  Song 
of  the  Valkyries." 


316  NOTES. 

2  the  loom,  etc.  "With  the  weaving  here  and 
in  the  "  Bard  "  compare  the  paraphrase  of  the 
gipsy's  song  in  *'  Guy  Mannering"  : — 

"  Twist  ye,  twine  ye  I  even  so 
Mingle  shades  of  joy  and  woe, 
Hope  and  fear,  and  peace  and  strife 
In  the  thread  of  iiuman  life. 

•  •  ■  •  • 

Now  they  wax  and  now  they  dwindle, 
Whirling  with  the  whirling  spindle,"  etc. 

17,  18.  The  names  of  the  sisters  in  the  orig- 
inal  are  Hilda,  Hiorthrimula,  Sangrida,  and 
Swipula.     see.     Lo !  used  inter jectionally. 

37-40.  desert  heach.  Gray  prints  and  spells 
thus — desart-beach. 

The  meaning  of  this  verse  is  that  the  tribe 
which  has  hitherto  been  confined  to  the  sea- 
coast  shall  rule  over  rich  provinces  in  the 
interior  of  Ireland. 

59,  60.  These  lines  are  not  in  the  original. 
The  reference  to  Scotland  is  explained  in  the 
Preface. 

Yarious  Headings. 

15.  Sioord.  Blade. — Wharton  MS. 

17.  Mista  black.     Sangrida. — Wharton  MS. 

18.  Sangrida.     Mista  black. — Wharton  MS. 
23.  Blade.  Sword.— Wharton  MS. 

28.  Triumpk  is  struck  out  and  '  conquer  '  in 
the  margin,  Pembroke  MS. 


THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN.  317 

31.  Gondula,  and  Geira.  Gunna  and   Gon- 
dula. — Pembroke  and  Wharton  MSS. 
33.  Slaughter,  havoc. — Pembroke  MS. 

44.  Shall.  Must.— Wharton  MS. 

45.  His.  Her.— Pembroke  MS. 
50.  Blot.  Veil.— Wharton  MS. 

59.    Winding.  Echoing. — Wharton  MS. 
64-66.-Sisters,  hence,  'tis  time  to  ride ; 

Now  your  thundering  f aulchion  wield  ; 
Now  your  sable  steed  bestride. 
Hurry,  hurry  to  the  field. 

— Pembroke  MS. 


YIIL— THE  DESCENT.  OF  ODIN. 

This  Ode,  as  well  as  the  preceding  and  the 
following  one,  was  first  published  in  the  edi- 
tion of  1768.  Mitford  follows  the  original  title 
in  the  Wharton  MS.  and  calls  it  "The  Yeg- 
tara's  Kivitha." 

The  original  is  to  be  found  in  Ssemund's 
Edda.  The  first  five  stanzas  of  this  Ode  are 
omitted  ;  in  which  Balder,  one  of  the  sons  of 
Odin,  was  informed  that  he  should  soon  die. 
Upon  his  communication  of  his  dream,  the 
other  gods,  finding  it  true,  by  consulting  the 
oracles,  agreed  to  ward  off  the  approaching 
danger,  and  sent  Frigga  to  exact  an  oath  from 
everything  not  to    injure  Balder.     She,  how- 


22— G  &  0— BB 


318  NOTES. 

ever,  overlooked  the  mistletoe,  with  a  branch 
of  which  he  was  afterwards  slain  by  Hoder,  at 
the  instigation  of  Lok.  After  the  execution  of 
this  commission,  Odin,  still  alarmed  for  the 
life  of  his  son,  called  another  council ;  and 
hearing  nothing  but  divided  opinions  among 
the  gods,  to  consult  the  Prophetess  "  he  up-rose 
with  speed."  Yali,  or  Ali,  the  son  of  Rinda, 
afterwards  avenged  the  death  of  Balder,  by 
slaying  Hoder,  and  is  called  a  "  wondrous  boy, 
because  he  killed  his  enemy,  before  he  was  a 
day  old ;  before  he  had  washed  his  face, 
combed  his  hair,  or  seen  one  setting-sun."  See 
Herbert's  "  Icelandic  Translations." — Mitford. 
The  first  five  stanzas  are  given  in  S.  Jones' 
edition  of  Gray. 

4.  Hela,  in  the  Edda,  is  described  with  a 
dreadful  countenance,  and  her  body  half  flesh- 
colour,  and  half  blue.* 

5.  The  Edda  gives  this  dog  the  name  of 
Managarmar.  He  fed  upon  the  lives  of  those 
that  were  to  die. — Mason. 

22.  In  a  little  poem  called  the  "  Magic  of 
Odin  "  (Bartholinus,  p.  641),  Odin  says,  "  If  I 
see  a  man  dead,  and  hanging  aloft  on  a  tree,  I 
engrave  Runic  characters  so  wonderful,  that 
the  man  immediately  descends  and  converses 
with  me.  When  I  see  mao;icians  travellins: 
through  the  air,  1  disconcert  them  with  a  single 


THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN.  319 

look,  and  force  them  to  abandon  their  enter- 
prise. " — Mitford. 

24.  verse  that  wakes  the  dead.  The  original 
word  is  Valgalldr\  from  Valr,  mortuus,  and 
Oalldr^  incantatio.* 

40.  Odin  we  find  both  from  this  Ode  and  the 
Edda  was  solicitous  about  the  fate  of  his  son, 
Balder,  who  had  dreamed  he  was  soon  to  die. 
The  Edda  mentions  the  manner  of  his  death 
when  killed  by  Odin's  other  son,  Hoder,  and 
also  that  Hoder  was  himself  slain  by  Vali,  the 
son  of  Odin  and  Einda,  consonant  with  this 
prophecy. — Mason. 

51.  Women  were  looked  upon  by  the  Gothic 
nations  as  having  a  peculiar  insight  into  futu- 
rity ;  and  some  there  were  that  made  profession 
of  magic  arts  and  divination.  These  travelled 
round  the  country,  and  were  received  in  every 
house  with  great  respect  and  honour.  Such  a 
woman  bore  the  name  of  Volva,  Seidkona,  or 
Spakona.  The  dress  of  Thorbiorga,  one  of 
these  prophetesses,  is  described  at  large  in 
Eirik's  "  Rauda  Sogu  "  (apud  Bartholin,  lib  iii. 
cap.  iv.  p.  688).  She  had  on  a  blue  vest  span- 
gled all  over  with  stones,  a  necklace  of  glass 

*  The  notes  marked  thus  (*)  are  marked  G  in  Mason's 
Notes,  but  they  never  appeared  in  any  edition  published 
in  Gray's  lifetime.  They  were  taken  by  Mason  from 
notes  in  Gray's  Commonplace  Book,  Pembroke  MSS. 


320  NOTES. 

beads,  and  a  cap  made  of  the  skin  of  a  black 
lamb  lined  with  white  cat-skin.  She  leaned  on 
a  staff  adorned  with  brass,  with  a  round  head 
set  with  stones  ;  and  was  girt  with  an  Hun- 
landish  belt,  at  which  hung  her  pouch  full  of 
magical  instruments.  Her  buskins  were  of 
rough  calf-skin,  bound  on  with  thongs  studded 
with  knobs  of  brass,  and  her  gloves  of  white 
cat-skin,  the  fur  turned  inwards,  etc.  They 
were  also  called  Fiolkyiigi^  or  Fiolkunnug,  i.e.y 
Multi-scia ;  and  Visindakona,  i.e.,  Oraculorum 
Mulier,  Nor^iir,  i.e.,  Parcae. 

55.  See  Matthew  Arnold's  "  Balder  Dead," 
1-8:— 

"So  on  the  floor  lay  Balder  dead  :  and  round 
Lay  thickly  strewn  swords,  axes,  darts,  and  spears, 
Which  all  the  Gods  in  sport  had  idly  thrown 
At  Balder,  whom  no  weapon  pierced  or  clove  ; 
But  in  his  breast  stood  fixt  the  fatal  bough 
Of  mistletoe,  which  Lok  the  Accuser  gave 
To  Hoder,  and  unwitting  Hoder  threw — 
'Gainst  that  alone  had  Balder's  life  no  charm." 

QQ.  King  Harold  made  (according  to  the 
singular  custom  of  his  time)  a  solemn  vow 
never  to  clip  or  corah  his  hair,  till  he  should 
have  extended  his  sway  over  the  whole  country. 
Herbert,  "  Icelandic  Translations."  In  the 
"  Dying  Song  of  k.'&\)iOYn.''^—Mitford. 

75.  What  virgins  these.   These  were  the  Norns 


THE  DESCENT  OF  ODIN.  321 

or  Fates,  invisible  to  mortals  ;  so  by  recogniz- 
ing them  Odin  revealed  his  divinity. 

Various  Readings  in  the  Wharton  MS. 

11.  Fruitless.     Ceaseless. 

14.  Shakes.     Quakes. 

23.  Accents.    Murmurs. 

27.   Call.     Voice. 

29.     My  troubled.     A  weary, 

35.  He.     This. 

41.    To7i.     The. 

48.  ReacJi.     Touch. 

51,  52.         Prophetess,  my  call  obey, 

Once  again  arise  and  say. 
59,  60.         Once  again  my  call  obey. 

Prophetess,  arise  and  say. 
61,  62.    Who  tK  Avenger.,  etc.     These  verses 
are  transposed  in  the  Wharton  MS. 
65.    Wond'rous.     Giant. 
74.  Awake.     Arise. 
77.   That.     Who.     Flaxen.     Flovs^ing. 
79.   Tell  me.     Say  from. 
83.  The  mightiest  of  the  mighty  line. 
87.  Hence  and.     Odin. 
90.  Has.     Have. 
92.  Has  7'eassumed.    Reassumes  her, 

21 


322  NOTES. 


IX.  THE  TRIUMPHS  OF  OWEK 

The  original  Welsh  of  the  above  poem  was  the 
composition  of  Gwalchmai,  the  son  of  Melir, 
immediately  after  Prince  Owen  Gwynedd  had 
defeated  the  combined  fleets  of  Iceland,  Den- 
mark, and  Norway,  which  had  invaded  his  ter- 
ritory on  the  coast  of  Anglesea.  There  is  like- 
wise another  poem  which  describes  this  famous 
battle,  written  by  Prince  Howel,  the  son  of 
Owen  Gwynedd. — Mitford. 

10.  Squadrons  three.  The  fleets  of  Ireland 
(Erin),  Denmark  (Lochlin),  and  Norway. 

11-14.  The  construction  is  :  "  This  (squad- 
ron) hiding  (concealing)  the  Irish  force  ;  Loch- 
lin, riding  side  by  side  as  proudly,  ploughs  the 
way,"  etc. 

13.  On  her  shadow.  The  Danish  fleet  sails 
on  the  shadow  it  makes  in  the  water.  Canning 
in  his  celebrated  simile,  speaks  of  "  those  tre- 
mendous fabrics  now  reposing  on  their  shadows 
in  perfect  stillness." — Candy.  Her  stands  for 
Lochlin,  an  army  or  fleet  being  often  described 
by  the  name  of  the  country  itself,  long  and 
gay  agree  with  Lochlin. 

14,  15.  See  Scott's  "  Lay  of  the  Last  Min- 
strel," vi.  22 :— 


THE  TRIUMPHS  OF  OWEN.  323 

*'  For  thither  came,  in  times  afar, 

Stern  LocJilin's  sons  of  roving  war, 

The  Norsemen  trained  to  spoil  and  blood." 

—324-326. 

22.  ruby  crest.  A  red  dragon  was  the  device 
Owen  wore, 

25.  Talymalfra.  Moelfre,  a  small  bay  on  the 
north-east  coast  of  Anglesea. 

27.  After  line  26  there  are  the  four  following 
lines  in  the  MS. ;  but,  though  Gray  never 
printed  them,  Mason  inserted  them  in  his  edi- 
tion,  and  they  have  been  retained  in  the  text 
by  all  subsequent  editors. 

Checked  by  the  torrent-tide  of  blood. 
Backward  Meinai  rolls  his  flood  ; 
While,  heaped  his  master's  feet  around, 
Prostrate  %varriors  gnaw  the  ground. 

27.  From  this  line  to  the  end  is  Gray's  am- 
plification rather  than  a  translation,  very  little 
of  it  being  in  the  original,  which  closes  as  fol- 
lows :  "  And  the  glory  of  our  Prince's  wide- 
wasting  sword  shall  be  celebrated  in  a  hundred 
languages,  to  give  him  his  merited  praise." 

The  omission  of  this  sentence  and  his  not 
printing  the  four  lines  quoted  above  may  ac- 
count for  Gray's  describing  this  as  "  a  Frag- 
ment." 

30,  31.  Marking  .  .  .  J^ear,  etc.  Marking 
ivith  indignant  looks  those  who  were  afraid  to 


324  NOTES. 

stop,  or  ashamed  to  fl3\  This  is  a  peculiar  use 
of  the  abstract  for  the  concrete.  Marking 
agrees  with  he. 


X.— THE  ELEGY. 

The  "  Elegy  Written  in  a  Country  Church- 
Yard  "  was  begun  at  Stoke-Poges  in  1742,  prob- 
ably about  the  time  of  the  death  of  Gray's 
uncle,  Jonathan  Kogers,  who  died  there  on  the 
21st  of  October.  In  the  winter  of  1749,  after 
the  death  of  his  aunt,  Mary  Antrobus,  Gray 
resumed  it  at  Cambridge,  and  finished  it  at 
Stoke  early  in  June,  1750  ;  and  on  the  12th  of 
that  month  he  sent  a  copy  of  it  in  MS.  to  Horace 
Walpole,  who  circulated  it  among  his  friends. 
On  the  10th  of  February,  1751,  Gray  received 
a  letter  from  the  editors  of  the  "  Magazine  of 
Magazines,"  asking  permission  to  publish  it. 
He  thereupon  wrote  next  day  to  Walpole,  as 
follows : — 

"  Cambridge,  Feb.  11, 1751. 

"  As  you  have  brought  me  into  a  little  sort 
of  distress,  you  must  assist  me,  I  believe,  to  get 
out  of  it  as  well  as  I  can.  Yesterday  I  had  the 
misfortune  of  receiving  a  letter  from  certain 
gentlemen  (as  their  bookseller  expresses  it), 
who  have  taken  the  '  Magazine  of  Magazines ' 


THE  ELEGY.  325 

into  their  hands.  They  tell  me  that  an  ingenious 
Poem,  called  '  Keflections  in  a  Country  Church- 
yard,'  has  been  communicated  to  them,  which 
they  are  printing  forthwith  ;  that  they  are  in- 
formed that  the  excellent  author  of  it  is  I  by 
name,  and  that  they  beg  not  only  his  indulgence 
but  the  honour  of  his  correspondence,  etc.  As 
I  am  not  at  all  disposed  to  be  either  so  indul- 
gent, or  so  correspondent  as  they  desire,  I  have 
but  one  bad  way  left  to  escape  the  honour 
they  would  inflict  upon  me ;  and  therefore 
am  obliged  to  desire  you  would  make  Dodsley 
print  it  immediately  (which  may  be  done  in 
less  than  a  week's  time),  from  your  copy,  but 
without  my  name,  in  what  form  is  most  con- 
venient for  him,  but  on  his  best  paper  and 
character ;  he  must  correct  the  press  himself, 
and  print  it  without  any  interval  between  the 
stanzas  because  the  sense  is  in  some  places  con- 
tinued beyond  them  ;  and  the  title  must  be, 
— Elegy,  written  in  a  Country  Church-yard.' 
If  he  would  add  aline  or  two  to  say  it  came 
to  his  hands  by  accident,  1  should  like  it  bettor. 
If  you  behold  the  'Magazine  of  Magazines'  in 
the  light  that  I  do,  you  will  not  refuse  to  give 
yourself  this  trouble  on  my  account,  which  you 
have  taken  of  your  own  accord  before  now.  1 1 
Dodsley  do  not  do  this  immediately,  he  may 
as  well  let  it  alone." 


326  NOTES. 

"Walpole  lost  no  time,  and  on  the  16th  of 
February  the  poem  was  published  in  a  quarto 
pamphlet,  the  following  being  the  contents  of 
the  title-page  : —  *'  An  Elegy  Wrote  in  a  Coun- 
try Church  Yard.  London :  Printed  for  R. 
Dodsley  in  Pali-Mall ;  and  sold  by  M.  Cooper 
in  Pater-Noster  Row.  1751.  ( Price  six- 
pence.) " 

This  then  was  the  first  appearance  of  the 
*' Elegy"  in  print.  It  was  anonymous,  and 
contained  these  prefatory  remarks  by  Wal- 
pole :  — 

Advertisement. — The  following  Poem  came 
into  my  Hands  by  Accident,  if  the  general  Ap- 
probation with  which  this  little  Piece  has  been 
spread,  may  be  called  by  so  slight  a  Term  as 
Accident.  It  is  this  Approbation  which  makes 
it  unnecessary  for  me  to  make  any  Apology  but 
to  the  Author  As  he  cannot  but  feel  some 
Satisfaction  in  having  pleas'd  so  many  Readers 
already,  I  flatter  myself  he  will  forgive  my 
communicating  that  Pleasure  to  many  more. — 
The  Editor. 

The  poem  was  at  once  reproduced  in  the 
magazines  ;  it  appeared  in  the  "  Magazine  of 
Magazines  "  on  the  28th  of  February,  in  the 
"  London  Magazine  "  and  in  the  "  Scots'  Maga- 
zine," on  the  31st  of  March  and  in  the  "  Grand 
Magazine  of  Magazines  "  on  the  30th  of  April. 


THE  ELEGY.  327 

Gray  has  entered  the  following  note  in  the 
margin  of  the  Pembroke  MS.  : — "  Published 
in  Febry.  1751,  by  Dodsley,  &  went  thro'  four 
editions,  in  two  months  ;  and  afterwards  a 
fifth,  6th,  Tth,  &  8th,  9th,  10th,  &  11th  ;  print- 
ed also  in  1753  with  Mr.  Bentley's  Designs,  of 
wch.  there  is  a  2d  edition  ;  &  again  by  Dodsley 
in  his  *  Miscellany,'  vol.  4th,  &  in  a  Scotch  Col- 
lection call'd  the '  Union ' ;  translated  into  Latin 
by  Chr.  Anstey,  Esq.,  and  the  Revd.  Mr.  Rob- 
erts, &  published  in  1762,  &  again  in  the  same 
year  by  Rob.  Lloyd,  M.  A." 

It  first  appeared  with  Gray's  name  in  the 
"  Six  Poems  "  of  1753. 

Mason  says  that  Gray  "  originally  gave  it 
only  the  simple  title  of  '  Stanzas  written  in  a 
Country  Church-yard,'  "  but  that  he  "  persuad- 
ed him  first  to  call  it  an  Elegy,  because  the 
subject  authorized  him  so  to  do,  and  the  alter- 
nate measure  seemed  particularly  fit  for  that 
species  of  composition  ;  also  so  capital  a  poem 
written  in  this  measure,  would  as  it  were  ap- 
propriate it  in  future  to  writings  of  this  sort." 

The  title  of  the  eighth  edition,  1753,  is 
"  Elegy,  originally  written  in  a  Country  Church- 
yard." 

Three  copies  of  the  "  Elegy  "  in  Gray's  hand- 
writing still  exist.  One  of  these  belonged  to 
Wharton,  and  is  now  among  the  Egerton  MSS. 


328  NOTES. 

in  the  British  Museum,  and  this  copy  is  there- 
fore referred  to  as  the  "  Egerton  MS."  The 
two  other  copies  were  among  the  "  books,  man- 
uscripts, coins,  music  printed  or  written  and 
papers  of  all  kinds,"  which  Gray  bequeathed 
in  his  will  to  Mason,  "  to  preserve  or  destroy  at 
his  own  discretion."  These  Mason  bequeathed 
to  Stonehewer  (Fellow  of  St.  Peter's  College, 
Cambridge,  and  a  friend  of  Gray's),  who,  at 
his  death  in  1809,  left  the  greater  portion  to 
Pembroke  College,  and  the  remainder  to  his 
friend  Mr.  Bright, — each  set  containing  a  copy 
of  the  "  Elegy."  The  copy  in  the  possession  of 
the  College  is  usually  described  as  the  "  Pem- 
broke MS., "  and  of  it  there  is  a  facsimile  in 
Mathias'  edition  of  Gray's  Works,  published  in 
1814.  The  collection  left  to  Mr.  Bright  was 
sold  by  auction  in  1845  ;  the  MS.  of  the 
"  Elegy  "  was  bought  by  Mr.  Granville  John 
Penn,  of  Stoke  Park,  for  £100  ;  in  1854  the  MS. 
was  sold  for  £131  ;  and  in  1875  it  was  bought 
by  Sir  William  Eraser  for  £230,  who  had  100 
copies  of  it  printed  in  1884.  Mr.  Rolfe  calls  this 
the  "  Eraser  MS. "  ;  and  Mr.  Gosse  refers  to  it 
as  the  "  Mason  MS."  ;  but  it  may  not  always 
belong  to  the  Eraser  family  ;  and  "  Mason  MS.  " 
is  not  suflBciently  distinctive,  as  the  "  Pembroke 
MS."  was  also  Mason's.  As  this  MS.  seems  to 
have   been    the   rough  draft,  and  contains  a 


THE  ELEGY.  329 

greater  number  of  original  readings  and  alter- 
ations,  the  other  two  apparently  being  made 
from  it  by  Gray  when  he  had  almost  ceased  cor- 
recting the  "  Elegy,"  I  shall  refer  to  it  in  the 
Notes  and  Various  Readings  as  the  "  Original 
MS." 

1.  The  Curfew.  The  curfew  was  a  bell,  or 
the  ringing  of  a  bell,  rung  at  eight  o'clock  in 
the  evening  for  putting  out  fires  (  Fr.  couvre, 
cover,  and  feu,  fire),  a  custom  introduced  by 
William  the  Conqueror.  The  word  continued 
to  be  applied  to  an  evening  bell  long  after  the 
law  for  putting  out  fires  ceased,  but  it  is  not 
now  so  used,  and  the  word  would  have  become 
obsolete  but  for  Gray's  use  of  it  here,  and  when 
one  speaks  of  the  curfew  one  thinks  of  the  first 
line  of  the  "  Elegy."  It  occurs  frequently  in 
Shakespeare,  and  Milton  uses  it  twice, — 
*'  Comus,"  435,  and  in  the  well-known  lines  in 
"  II  Penseroso  ''  : — 

"  I  hear  the  far-off  curfew  sound 
Over  some  wide-watered  shore." — 74,  75. 

Gray  quotes  in  original  the  lines  from  Dante 
which  suggested  this  line.  Gary's  translation 
is  as  follows : — 

"  And  pilgrim,  newly  on  his  road  with  love, 
Tlirills  if  he  hear  the  vesper  bell  from  far, 
That  seems  to  mourn  for  the  expiring  day." 


330  NOTES. 

2.  wind.  This  is  the  correct  reading,  as, 
though  winds  occur  in  the  first  printed  edition 
(1751),  wind  is  what  Gray  has  in  the  MS.  copies 
and  in  the  first  edition  of  his  Poems  (1768),  as 
well  as  in  all  reprints  of  the  "  Elegy  "  approved 
by  him.  After  1751  the  first  edition  I  find 
with  winds  is  Stephen  Jones'  (1799),  and  though 
Mitford  in  his  edition  of  1814  has  wind  in  the 
Aldine  edition  (1836)  he  has  winds,  and  is  fol- 
lowed— without  comment — by  almost  all  sub- 
sequent editors  of  Gray's  "  Poems,"  and  in 
popular  reprints  of  the  "  Elegy."  Another 
false  reading  is  herds  for  herd. 

13.  that  yew-tree.  The  yew-tree  under  which 
Gray  often  sat  in  Stoke  churchyard  still  exists 
there ;  it  is  on  the  south  side  of  the  church,  it? 
branches  spread  over  a  large  circumference, 
and  under  it  as  well  as  under  its  shade  there 
are  several  graves. 

14.     Wakefield     quotes      from      Parnell's 
«  Night  Piece  on  Death  "  (1722)  :— 

"  Those  graves  with  bending  osier  bound, 

That  nameless  heave  the  crumbled  ground." — 29,  30. 

16.  rudeYieve  means  rustic,  simple ;  he  applies 
it  to  the  beach,  "  Spring,"  13.  Throughout  the 
"  Elegy"  he  refers  to  the  poor,  the  people  of 
the  hamlet,  as  contrasted  with  the  rich,  who 
were  interred  and  had  their  monmuents  inside 


THE  ELEGY.  331 

the  church.  In  the  MSS.  left  by  Mitford,  now 
in  the  British  Museum,  he  has  recorded  the  fol- 
lowing line  found  among  Gray's  papers,  jotted 
down  probably  for  the  "  Elegy,"  of.  lines  57-60 ; 
it  may  be  quoted  here  as  an  illustration  of  his 
use  of  rude  : — 

"  The  rude  Columbus  of  an  infant  world." 

13-16.  This  stanza  and  the  ninth  form  the 
inscription  on  the  east  side  of  the  monument  to 
Gray  in  Stoke  Park. 

17.  incense-hreathing.  Sending  forth  fragrant 

smells. 

"  Now  whenas  sacred  light  began  to  dawn 
In  Eden  on  the  humid  flowers,  that  breathed 
Their  morning  incense.''— Par.  Lost,  ix.  192-194. 

19.  The  coc^s  shrill  clarion.  A  clarion  is  a 
wind  instrument,  a  kind  of  trumpet,  with  a 
shrill  sound,  from  Lat.  clarus,  clear.  It  is 
from  Milton  that  he  takes  clarion  for  the  sound 
of  the  cock's  crow  : — 

"  .  .  .  .  the  crested  cock,  whose  clarion  sounds 
The  silent  hours."— Par.  Lost,  vii.  443. 

Cf.  also  : — 

"  When  chanticleer  with  clarion  shrill  recalls 
The  tardy  day."— Philip's  Cyder,  i.  753  (pub.  1708). 

"  The  cock  that  is  the  trumpet  to  the  morn 
Doth  with  his  lofty  and  shrill-sounding  throat 
Awake  the  god  of  day."— Haialet,  i.  1.  150. 


g32  NOTES. 

In  the  original  MS.  the  reading  is : — "  Or 
chanticleer  so  shrill  or  echoing  horn " ;  the 
word  "  chanticleer "  itself  meaning  "  clear- 
singing,"  and  the  name  of  the  cock  in  Chaucer's 
"  Nun's  Priest's  Tale  "  was  *  Chauntecleer.' 
the  echoing  horn.  The  huntsman's  horn,  that 
wakens  echoes.     Cf.  Milton  again  : — 

"  Oft  listening  how  the  hounds  and  horn 
Cheerly  rouse  the  slumbering  morn, 
From  the  side  of  some  hoar  hill 
Through  the  high  wood  echoing  shrill." 

—V Allegro,  53. 

20.  their  lowly  hed.  The  humble  bed  in  which 
they  have  been  sleeping.  Lloyd  in  his  Latin 
translation  strangely  mistook  "  lowly  bed  "  for 
the  grave. 

21-24.  The  following  are  parallel  passages  :— 

"  Jam  jam  non  domus  acciplet  te  laeta,  neque  uxor 
Optima,  nee  dulces  occurrent  oscula  nati 
Praeripere,  et  tacita  pectus  dulcedine  tangent." 

— Lucretius,  ill.  894. 

"  Quod  si  pudica  mulier  in  partem  juvet 

Domum  atque  dulces  liberos,  .  .  . 
Sacrum  et  vetustis  exstruat  lignis  focum 

Lassi  sub  adventum  viri." — Horace,  Epode,  ii.  39. 

"  In  vain  for  him  the  officious  wife  prepares 
The  fire  fair-blazing,  and  the  vestment  warm  ; 
In  vain  his  little  children,  peeping  out 
Into  the  mingled  storm,  demand  their  sire 
With  tears  of  artless  innocence." 

—Thomson,  Winter, 


THE  ELEGY.  333 

22.  jply  Tier  .  .  .  care.  Be  busied  at  her 
household  duties.  Some  annotators  talie  ex- 
ception to  this  use  of  ply  ;  but  it  is  a  shortened 
form  of  apply  similarly  used  by  Milton  and  old 
writers  : — "  He  is  ever  at  his  plow,  he  is  ever 
applying  his  iusiness.'^ — Latimer. 

"  The  birds   their  choir  apply.— Pai\   Lost,   iv.   264. 
"  Assiduous  in  his  bower  the  wailing  owl 
Plies  his  sad  song."— Thomson,  Winter,  114. 

And  Gray  has  "  their  labours  ply  "  in  the  "  Ode 
on  Eton,"  32.  The  expression  is  a  good  in- 
stance of  the  poetical  language  against  which 
Wordsworth  protested.  When  he  had  occa- 
sion to  refer  to  a  similar  scene,  he  wrote : — 

"  And  she  I  cherished  turned  her  wheel 
Beside  an  English  fire." 

25.  the  stiMorn  glehe.  Luke  quotes  from 
Gay's  «  Fables  "  :— 

"  'Tis  mine  to  tame  the  stxCbhom  glebe.'" 

Glehe  is  used  in  its  primary  sense  from  Lat. 
gleha.,  a  sod,  the  ground  : — 

"  Rastris  glebas  qui  frangit   inertes. "—(Jeorgrzcs,  i.  94. 

2Y.  afield.  To  the  field.  Milton's  expres- 
sion, "  we  drove  afield,"  "  Lycidas,"  27. 

28.  Wakefield  quotes  from  Spenser's  "  Shep- 
herd 's  Kalendar  "  : — 


334  NOTES. 

"  But  to  the  root  bent  his  sturdie  stroah, 
And  made  many  wounds  in  the  wast  oak." 

— February. 

sturdy  stroke  also  occurs  in  Dryden's  transla- 
tion of  the  "  Georgics,"  iii.  639. 

32.  This,  like  many  another  line  of  the 
"  Elegy,"  may  be  said  to  be  part  of  the  English 
language ;  it  was  "  chiselled  for  immortality." 

33-36.  This  stanza  is  the  second  of  the  two 
on  the  east  side  of  the  monument,  vide  note  on 
13-16. 

Hurd  refers  to  these  lines  in  his  note  on  the 
following  passage  in  Cowley  : — 

"  Beauty,  and  strength,   and  wit,  and  wealth,  and 
power, 

Have  their  short  flourishing  hour  ; 
And  love  to  see  themselves,  and  smile, 
And  joy  in  their  pre-eminence  a  while  ; 

E'en  so  in  the  same  land 
Poor  weeds,  rich  corn,  gay  flowers  together  stand. 
Alas  1  Death  mows  down  all  with  an  impartial  hand." 

But  Gray  is  likely  to  have  had  West  and  his 
"  Monody  on  Queen  Caroline  "  in  his  mind ; 
not  only  as  the  early  death  of  his  friend  which 
occurred  a  few  months  before  he  began  to  write 
the  "  Elegy,"  was  almost  always  before  him, 
but  as  West's  Ode  (which  Gray  refers  to  in  a 
letter  in  Nov.  1747  as,  "  in  spite  of  the  subject, 
excellent  ")  had  been  published  a  few  months 


THE  ELEGY.  335 

before  he  finished  the  "  Elegy,"  in  Yol.  II.  of 
Dodsley's  "  Collection,"  immediately  after 
Gray's  three  Odes.     The  lines  are  : — 

"These  are  thy  glorious  deeds,  almighty  Death  I 

These  are  thy  triumphs  o'er  the  sons  of  men, 
That  now  receive  the  miserable  breath, 

Which  the  next  moment  they  resign  agrin  I 
Ah  me  !  what  boots  us  all  our  boasted  jwiver, 

Our  golden  treasure,  and  our  purple  state  ; 
They  cannot  ward  th'  inevitable  hour, 

Nor  stay  the  fearful  -violence  of  fate." — 73--80. 

35.  Awaits.  This  is  Gray's  reading  in  his 
MSS.  and  in  the  editions  published  by  him ; 
but  almost  all  editors  follow  Mason  and  Mitford 
and  read  await.  Scott  of  Amwell  in  his  "  Crit- 
ical Essay  "  on  the  "  Elegy,"  published  in  1785, 
writes  in  a  footnote  :  "  It  should  be  aioait,  the 
plural,  for  it  includes  a  number  of  circum- 
stances." I  have  traced  await  back  to  the 
appearance  of  the  "Elegy  "  in  Dodsley's "  Col- 
lection of  Poems,"  i.e.,  in  Volume  IV.  published 
in  1755.  But  as  in  the  editions  of  the  "  Elegy  " 
in  1753,  "  corrected  by  the  author,"  and  in  his 
last  edition,  1768,  Gray  prints  awaits,  it  is  clear 
that  he  intended  it  to  be  so  retained  ;  besides, 
it  is  better  to  take  "  inevitable  hour  "  as  the 
subject  of  "  awaits,"  and  not  "  boast,"  "  pomp," 
etc. ;  as  not  only  is  this  inversion  more  in  Gray's 
manner,    but   also   the  statement  that  the  in- 


336  NOTES. 

evitable  hour  of  death  is  waiting  for  the  great, 
the  beautiful  and  the  wealthy,  like  the 

"  whirlwind's  sway, 
That  hushed  in  grim  repose  expects  his  evening  prey." 

Also  see  "  Epitaph  on  Mrs.  Clarke,"  11 ;  and 
"  Shakespeare  Yerses,"  8. 

36.  In  Hayley's  life  of  Crashaw,"  in  the 
Biographia  Britannica,  it  is  said  that  this  line 
is  "  literally  translated  from  the  Latin  prose  of 
Bartholinus  in  his  Danish  Antiquities." 

44.  dull  cold.  These  words  occur  together  in 
Shakespeare : — 

"  And,  when  I  am  forgotten,  as  I  shall  be, 
And  sleep  in  dull  cold  marble." 

—Henry  VIII.  iii.  2.  433. 

46.  pregnant  with  celestial  fire.  Full  of 
heaven-sent  inspiration  ;  cf.  "  the  Muse's^^me," 
line  72  ;  a  "  prophet's  fire,''  "  The  Bard,"  21. 
Cowper  has  the  expression  in  "  Boadicea  " : — 

"  Sucli  the  bard's  prophetic  words, 

Pregnant  with  celestial  fire, 
Bending  as  he  swept  the  chords 

Of  his  sweet  but  awful  lyre." 

47.  rod.  He  first  wrote  reins  /  and  changed 
it  probably  because  Tickell  has  it  in  his  lines 
on  the  death  of  Addison  "  To  Earl  Warwick  "  : — 

"  Proud  names,  who  once  the  reins  of  empire  held." 

—37. 

63-56.  Various  originals  have  been  cited  for 


THE  ELEGY.  337 

this  famous  stanza,  but  often  as  the  thought 
may  have  occurred  before  Gray  it  is  in  the 
form  in  which  he  has  worded  it  that  it  is  known 
the  world  over.     Mitford  quotes  : — 

"  There  is  many  a  rich  stone  laid  up  in  the 
bowels  of  the  earth,  many  a  fair  pear'l  in  the 
bosom  of  the  sea,  that  never  was  seen,  nor  never 
shall  be."  Bishop  Hall's  "Contemplations," 
vi.  872. 

A  writer  in  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  "  for 
May,  1782,  refers  to  Young,  "  Universal  Pas- 
sion "  : — 
"  In  distant  wilds,  by  human  eyes  unseen, 
She  rears  her  flowers,  and  spreads  her  velvet  green  ; 
Pure  gurgling  rills  the  lonely  desert  trace, 
And  ivaste  their  music  on  the  savage  race." — Sat.  v. 

Gray  introduces  "  the  gem  and  the  flower  "  in 
his  "  Ode  at  the  Installation  "  (written  nearly 
twenty  years  later)  thus  : — 

"  Thy  liberal  heart,  thy  judging  eye, 
Thefloiver  unheeded  shall  descry. 
And  bid  it  round  heaven's  altars  shed 
The  fragrance  of  its  blushing  head  ; 
Shall  raise  from  earth  the  latent  gem 
To  glitter  on  the  diadem."— 71-76. 

56.  This  line  occurs  in  Churchill's  "  Gotham," 

ii.   19,    20,  published    1764,  by   which   time  it 

was  probably  a  familiar  quotation  : — 

"  So  that  they  neither  give  a  tawdry  glare, 
Nor  waste  their  sweetness  on  the  desert  air.' " 


338  NOTES. 

59.  For  the  allusions  to  Hampden  (1594- 
1643),  Milton  (1608-1674),  and  Cromwell  (1599- 
1658),  the  student  should  refer  to  a  History. 

Instead  of  these  three  names  there  are,  in  the 
Original  MS.,  Cato,  Tully,  and  Caesar;  but 
the  change  to  well-known  characters  of  our 
own  country  has  added  to  the  vividness  as  well 
as  fixed  the  nationality  of  a  poem  that  has  been 
translated  into  so  many  languages. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  both  Hampden  and 
Milton  lived  in  Buckinghamshire — the  county  in 
which  is  the  Stoke-Poges  Churchyard.  Hamp- 
den was  M.P.  for  Buckingham,  and  it  was  as 
a  resident  of  that  county  that  he  refused  to 
pay  ship  money.  Chalfont,  in  which  is  the  cot- 
tage where  Milton  finished  "  Paradise  Lost," 
is  only  a  few  miles  from  the  "  Churchyard  " 
of  the  "  Elegy." 

Mitford  quotes  the  following  from  Plautus 
as  the  thought  in  brief  of  this  stanza  and  lines 
45-48  :— 

"  Ut  saepe  summa  ingenia  in  occulto  latent, 
Hie  qualie  imperator,  nunc  privatus  est." 

— Captiv.  iv.  2. 

63.  To  scatter  plenty,  etc.  Mitford  quotes 
a  line  from  Tickell,  and  one  from  Mrs.  Behn 
containing  these  expressions  ;  but  Gray  repeats 
what  he  wrote  in  "Education  and  Govern- 
ment  " : — 


THE  ELEGY.  339 

"  If  equal  Justice  with  unclouded  face 

Smile  not  indulgent  on  the  rising  race, 

And  scatter  with  a  free,  though  frugal,  hand 

Like  golden  showers  of  plenty  o'er  the  Za«d."— 15-18. 

The  early  poems  and  translations  of  Gray, 
unpublished  in  his  lifetime,  and  now  so  little 
read,  are  like  a  storehouse  from  which  he  took 
thoughts  and  expressions  for  the  "  Odes  "  and 
"  Elegy."  In  "  Agrippina  "  he  has  "  the  sen- 
ate's joint  applause,"  77  ("  Elegy,"  61) ;  "  he 
lived  unknown  to  fame  or  fortune,"  38  ("  Elegy," 
118),  and  (besides  several  others) : — 

"  Thus  ever  grave  and  undisturbed  reflection 
Pours  its  cool  dictates  in  the  madding  ear 
Of  rage,  and  thinks  to  quench  the  fire  it  feels  not." 

—81-83. 

70.  quench  the  blushes.  This  is  in  Shake- 
speare, "  Winter's  Tale,"  iv.  4.  67  :-- - 

"  Come,  quench  your  blushes,  and  present  yourself." 

ingenuous.  Genuine,  natural ;  the  "  in  "  has 
not  a  negative  force. 

72.  After  this  verse,  in  the  Original  MS. 
of  the  poem,  are  the  four  following  stanzas  : — 

The  thoughtless  world  to  Majesty  may  bow. 

Exalt  the  brave,  and  idolize  success  ; 
But  more  to  innocence  their  safety  owe 

Than  power  and  genius  e'er  conspired  to  bless. 

And  thou,  who  mindful  of  th'  unhonoured  dead 
Dost  in  these  notes  their  artless  tale  relate, 


340  NOTES. 

By  Night  and  lonely  Contemplation  led 
To  linger  in  the  gloomy  walks  of  Fate  ; 

Hark ;  how  the  sacred  Calm,  that  broods  around, 
Bids  ev'ry  fierce  tumultuous  passion  cease  ; 

In  still  small  accents  whispering  from  the  ground 
A  grateful  earnest  of  eternal  Peace. 

No  more  with  reason  and  thyself  at  strife, 
Give  anxious  cares  and  endless  wishes  room  ; 

But  thro'  the  cool  sequestered  vale  of  life 
Pursue  the  silent  tenor  of  thy  doom. 

73.  madding.  "  Maddening  "  would  be  the 
more  correct  formation ;  but  Gray's  use  of 
madding  has  given  it  currency,  and  "  Far  from 
the  Madding  Crowd  "  has  been  adopted  as  the 
title  of  a  novel,  just  as  "  Annals  of  the  Poor," 
32,  supplies  the  title  of  Leigh  Richmond's  well- 
known  work.  Rogers  quotes  from  one  of  Drum= 
mond's  "  Sonnets  "  : — - 

"  Far  from  the  madding  worldling's  hoarse  discord." 

Madding  occurs  in  "  Paradise  Lost "  : — 

"  the  madding  wheels 
Of  brazen  chariots  raged." — vi.  210. 

Gray  has  it  in  "Agrippina,"  83,  already  quoted. 
81.  sj)elt  hy  W  unlettered  Muse  means  com- 
posed or  engraved  b}^  an  illiterate  person.  Gray 
had  probably  in  mind  that  under  the  yew-tree 
there  is  a  tombstone  with  several  words  wrongly 
spelt  and  some  letters  ill-formed,  and  that  even 


THE  ELEGY.  341 

in  the  inscription  which  he  composed  for  his 
aunt's  tomb  the  word  resurrection  is  spelt  in- 
correctly by  the  unlettered  stone-cutter. 

85-88.  This  stanza  is  capable  of  two  construc- 
tions, according  as  we  take  frey  in  agreement 
with  who  or  with  heinij.  I  prefer  the  former : — 
For  what  person,  a  prey  to  forgetfulness,  ever 
resigned  his  life,  and  left  the  world,  without 
casting  a  regretful  look  behind  ?  If  jprey  be 
taken  with  heing^  then  "  to  dumb  Forgetfulness 
a  prey  "  is  the  completion  of  the  predicate 
resigned^  and  we  have  two  questions  asked : — 
For  who  ever  resigned  this  life  to  be  a  prey  to 
forgetfulness,  and  left  the  world  without,  etc.  ? 

85.  The  For  refers  to  what  has  gone  before, 
lines  Y7-84: ;  even  to  these  poor  rustics  there  are 
memorials  that  ask  for  the  sympathy  of  the 
passer-by,  because  who  ever  left  the  world 
without  a  regretful  look  and  a  desire  to  be  re- 
membered %  ajprey^  given  over  to,  the  victim  of. 

87.  precincts  of  the  day.  Gray  probably 
took  this  expression  from  "  Paradise  Lost,"  iii. 
88,  the  only  place  in  .Milton's  poems  where 
"  precincts  "  occurs : — 

"  Not  far  off  Heaven,  in  the  precincts  of  light." 

89-92.  This  stanza  may  be  regarded  as  an 
answer  to  the  question  in  the  last :  When  dying 
one  rests  on  some  loving  friend,  and  needs  the 


22— a  &  G— cc 


342  NOTES. 

tears  of  affection  ;  and  even  after  one  is  buried 
the  same  natural  desire  for  loving  remem- 
brance shows  itself  ;  and  when  all  is  dust  and 
ashes  the  fire  that  was  accustomed  to  be  in 
those  ashes  lives  in  them  (and  finds  expression 
in  the  inscription  on  the  tombs). 

Here  Mitford  quotes  Drayton  and  Pope : — 

*'  It  is  some  comfort  to  a  wretch  to  die, 
(If  there  be  comfort  in  the  way  of  death) 
To  have  some  friend,  or  kind  alliance  by 
To  be  officious  at  the  parting  breath."— ilibses. 
*'  No  friend's  complaint,  no  hind  domestic  tear 
Pleased  thy  pale  ghost,  or  graced  thy  mournful  bier, 
By  foreign  hands  thy  dying  eyes  were  closed.'" 

—Elegy,  81. 

92.  The  translation  (by  ISTott)  of  the   lines 
Gray  quotes  from  Petrarch  is  : — 

"  These,  my  sweet  fair,  so  warns  prophetic  thought, 
(Closed  thy  bright  eye,  and  mute  thy  poet's  tongue) 
E'en  after  death  shall  still  with  sparks  be  fraught." 

Gray  translated  this  sonnet  into  Latin  Ele- 
giacs, the  last  two  lines  of  his  version  being : — 

Infelix  musa  seternos  spirabit  amores, 
Ardebitque  urna  multa  fa  villa  mea, 

Still  more  closely  does  line  92  resemble  one  in 
Chaucer,  in  the  "  Reeve's  Prologue,"  speaking 
of  old  men  not  forgetting  the  passions  of  their 
youth : — 

"  Yet  in  our  ashen  cold  is  fire  yreken." — 3880. 


THE  ELEGY.  343 

It  has  been  suggested  that  the  first  line  of  this 
stanza  seems  to  regard  the  near  approach  of 
death  ;  the  second,  its  actual  advent ;  the  third, 
the  time  immediately  succeeding  its  advent ;  the 
fourth,  a  time  still  later. 

93-96.  This  stanza  is  altered  from  the  second 
of  the  rejected  stanzas  quoted  above  as  coming 
after  line  72  in  the  Original  MS. ;  and  in  that 
MS.  instead  of  this  stanza  (lines  93-96)  there 
are  two,  the  entry  in  the  MS.  being : — "  For 
thee  Avho  mindful,  etc.,  as  above,"  i.e,  the  re- 
mainder of  the  rejected  stanza,  and  after  that 
the  following : — 

"  If  chance  that  e'er  some  pensive  spirit  more 
By  sympathetic  musings  here  delayed, 

With  vain  tho'  kind  inquiry  shall  explore 
Thy  once  loved  haunt,  this  long  deserted  shade. 

98.  peep  of  dawn.  Both  here  and  in  the 
"  Installation  Ode  "  Gray  has  Milton's  expres- 
sions in  view : — 

"  See  the  blabbing  eastern  scout, 

The  nice  Morn,  on  the  Indian  steep, 

From  her  cabined  loopliole  peep, 

And  to  the  tell-tale  sun  descry 

Our  concealed  solemnity."— Comus,  138-142. 

And  in  the  "  Installation    Ode "  he   puts   the 

following  words  into  Milton's  mouth, — dawn 

rhyming  as  here  with  laion  : — 

"  Oft  at  the  blush  of  dawn 

I  trod  your  level  lawn." — 30,  31. 


344  NOTES. 

99,  100.  Brushing  ...  the  dews  .  .  .  uj)- 
land  lawn.     Milton's  words  again  : — 

..."  though  from  off  the  boughs  each  morn 
We  brush  mellifluous  deivs." — Par.  Lost,   v.  428,  429. 

*'  Together  both,  ere  the  high  lawns  appeared 
Under  the  opening  eyelids  of  the  morn, 
We  drove  afield." — Lycidas,  25-27. 

After  this  stanza  there  is  the  following  in  the 
Original  MS.  :— 

Hira  have  we  seen  the  greenwood  side  along, 
While  o'er  the  heath  we  hied,  our  labours  done, 

Oft  as  the  woodlark  piped  her  farewell  song. 
With  wistful  eyes  pursue  the  setting  sun. 

"  I  rather  wonder  that  he  rejected  this  stanza, 
as  it  not  only  has  the  same  sort  of  Doric  del- 
icacy which  charms  us  peculiarly  in  this  part 
of  the  poem,  but  also  completes  the  account  of 
his  whole  day ;  whereas,  this  evening  scene 
being  omitted,  we  have  only  his  morning  walk, 
and  his  noon-tide  repose." — Mason. 

In  a  footnote  the  reviewer  of  Mason's  edition 
of  Gray's  Poems,  in  the  "  Gentleman's  Maga- 
zine," June,  1775,  says  Gray  plainly  alludes  to 
this  stanza  and  this  evening  employment  when 
in  a  subsequent  stanza  he  mentions  not  only  the 
customed  hill,  etc.,  but  also  the  heath. 

101.  yonder  nodding  beech.  It  is  "  at  the 
fooV^  of  a  beech  that  Gray  describes  himself  as 
"squatting,"  in  a  letter  to  Walpole  (already 


THE  ELEGY.  345 

quoted,  note  on  line  17  of  the  "  Ode  on  the 
Spring"),  and  there  he  "grows  to  the  trunk 
for  a  whole  morning." 

103.  listless  length.  Cf.  in  "As  You  Like 
It,"ii.  1,31:— 

"  He  lay  along 
Under  an  oak,  whose  antique  roots  peep  out 
Upon  the  brook  that  brawls  along  this  wood." 

107.  In  the  Pembroke  MS.  there  is  no  comma 
after  drooping^  and  there  is  a  hyphen  between 
wof ul  and  wan.  Mitford  prints  "  wof ul-wan, " 
but  in  the  printed  copies  published  in  Gray's 
lifetime  the  line  stands  as  in  this  edition,  wo- 
ful  wan  means  sad  and  pale,  not  "  wofully 
pale." 

110.  Along  the  heath,  the  reference  is  to  the 
heath  mentioned  in  the  rejected  stanza  which 
came  after  line  100.  his  fav'rite  tree,  the  tree 
that  he  was  fond  of  lying  under  (lines  101-104) ; 
not  necessarily  that  he  preferred  the  beech  to 
other  kinds  of  trees,  but  this  beech  was  his 
favourite  resort. 

105-112.  These  two  stanzas  form  the  inscrip- 
tion on  the  monument  to  Gray,  in  Stoke  Park, 
on  the  side  that  faces  the  church. 

114.  the  church-way  path,  the  path  leading 
(from  the  main  road)  to  the  church.  Shake- 
speare has  the  phrase  in  "  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream  "  : — 


346  NOTES. 

"  Now  it  is  the  time  of  night 

That,  the  graves  all  gaping  wide, 
Every  one  lets  forth  his  sprite, 
In  the  church-way  paths  to  glide." — v.  1.  386-389. 

Gray  may  not  have  taken  the  words  from 
Shakespeare  ;  the  graveyard  at  Stoke-Poges  is 
reached  by  paths  leading  from  the  road  ;  and  it 
is  one  of  these  paths  rather  than  a  path  in  the 
graveyard  that  is  referred  to. 

115.  for  thou  canst  read.  Mr  Hales  con- 
siders that  these  words  are  introduced  because 
"  reading  was  not  such  a  common  accomplish- 
ment then  that  it  could  be  taken  for  granted  "  ; 
and  Mr.  Rolfe  says  "  the  '  hoary-headed  swain  ' 
of  course  could  not  read."  I  rather  take  it  as 
a  poetical  turn,  a  repetition  that  gives  vivid- 
ness to  the  speech  of  the  old  swain,  and  well 
brought  in  as  he  had  not  hitherto  personally 
addressed  the  kindred  spirit.  Cf.  the  follow- 
ing from  Milton  and  Young  : — 

"  And  chiefly  thou,  O  Spirit !  .  . 
Instruct  me  (for  thou  knowest)  .  .  ." 

—Par.  Lost,  i.  17,  19. 

"  And  steal  (for  you  can  steal)  celestial  fire." 

lay  is  used  for  the  sake  of  the  rhyme,  and 
not  in  its  strict  sense  of  song  or  lyrical  poem, 
but  here  stands  for  verse  or  poetry  ;  cf .  ''  Ode 
for  Music, "  14,  and  "  Imitations  from  the 
Welsh,"  5. 


THE  ELEGY.  347 

116.  In  the  Pembroke  MS.  of  the  "  Elegy  " 
Gray  has  entered  after  this  stanza :  "  Insert 

There  scattered  oft,  the  earliest  of  the  year, 
By  hands  unseen,  are  showers  of  violets  found  ; 

The  red-breast  loves  to  build,  and  warble  there, 
And  little  footsteps  lightly  print  the  ground." 

This  stanza,  which  may  be  described  as  "  the 
redbreast  stanza,"  was  first  printed  in  the  thiy^d 
edition  of  the  "  Elegy,"  the  date  of  which  I 
have  been  able  to  fix  as  March,  1751,  as  I  find 
the  "  Elegy  "  with  the  redbreast  stanza  in  the 
"  Scots'  Magazine  "  for  that  month,  and  it  was 
then  published  in  the  end  of  the  month.  Op- 
posite this  stanza  in  the  Pembroke  MS.  Gray 
has  written  "  Omitted,  1753."  Mason  states 
that  the  reason  for  his  omitting  it  was  "  be- 
cause he  thought  that  it  was  too  long  a  paren- 
thesis in  this  place."  Another  reason  may  be 
that  this  stanza  was  different  in  character  from 
the  preceding,  as  it  dealt  in  fancies  whereas 
the  former  described  facts.  Also  he  may  have 
noted  the  resemblance  it  bears  to  some  expres- 
sions and  lines  in  Collins'  "  Dirge  in  Cymbeline  " 
(pub.  1747)  :— 

"Soft  maids  and  village  hinds  shall  bring 
Each  opening  sweet  of  earliest  bloom.  .  .  . 
The  red-hreast  oft,  at  evening  hours. 
Shall  kindly  lend  its  little  aid,"  etc. 

118.  This  line    has    become    a    hackneyed 


348  NOTES. 

quotation.     In  Gray's  translation  of  Propertius 
he  has — 

♦'  Happy  the  youth  and  not  unknown  to  Fame." 
119.  Science.  Knowledge  in  general ;  see  "  Ode 
on  Eton,"  3,  where  it  is  applied  to  the  learning 
that  is  to  be  had  in  that  College,  frowned  not 
on  his  hirth^  looked  favourably  on  him.  Wake- 
field quotes  from  Horace  : — 

"  Quern  tu,  Melpomene,  semel 

Nascentem  placido  lumine  videris." — Odes,  iv.  3. 

Whom  thou,  Melpomene,  may  have  looked  on 
with  a  favourable  eye  at  the  hour  of  his  birth. 
123.  all  he  had.  Mitford  and  others  misprint 
this  by  placing  these  words  in  brackets ;  it  does 
not  mean  to  say  that  "  he  gave  to  Mis'ry  a  tear," 
but  he  gave  to  Misery  all  he  had,  and  that  all 
was  only  a  tear. 

Various  Eeadings. 
Except  where  otherwise  noted,  the  follow- 
ing "  various  readings  "  are  from  the  Original 
MS. 

6.  All.    Now.     8.    And.   Or.— Egerton  MS. 
17,   For  ever  sleep  ;  the  breezy  call  of  Morn, 

Or  swallow,  etc. 
19.  Or  chanticleer  so  shrill,  or  echoing  horn. 

24.  Or.     Nor.     Envied.     Coming. 

25.  Sickle.     Sickles.—Egerton  MS. 

29.    Useful,    Homely.     30.   Homely.  Eustic. 


THE  ELEGY.  349 

37,  38.  Forgive,   ye  proud,  th'  involuntary 
fault, 
If  Memory  to  these  no  trophies  raise. 

All  MSS. 
The  present  reading  is  written  in  the  margin. 
43.  Pi'ovoke.      Awake.     47     Rod.     Reins. 
— Egerton  MS. 

51.   Reiyressed.    Had    damped.     57.    Hamp- 
den.    Cato. 

59.  Milton.     Tully.    60.    Cromwell.     Caesar. 
QQ.  Growing.     Struggling.     68.  And.  Or. — 
Egerton  MS. 

71.  Or  heap.    And  at  the.    Shrine.  Shrines. 
— Egerton  MS. 

72.  With.     Burn.     74.    Learned.     Knew. 
76.  Noiseless.    Silent.    79.    Rhimes.    Rhime. 
82.  Elegy.     Epitaph. 

92.  And  buried  ashes  glow  with  social  fires. — 
Original  MS. 

And  in  our  ashes  glow  their  wonted  fires. — 
Egerton  and  Pembroke  MSS. 
97.  May.     Shall. 

99,  100.     With   hasty   footsteps   brush    the 
dews  away. 
On  the  high  brow  of  yonder  hang- 
ing lawn. 
101.   There.     Oft.     Nodding.     IToary. 
105.  Hard    hy    yon    wood.     With   gestures 
quaint. 


350  NOTES. 

106.  He  would.    Would  he. — Egerton  and 
Pembroke  MSS. 

107.  Now    woful    wan   he  drooped,  as  one 

forlorn. 
109.  /.     We.     110.  By    the   heath-side  and 

at  his  fav'rite  tree. 
113.  Due.     Meet.     116.      Graved.      Wrote. 

121.  Soul.     Heart. 
126,  127.     Nor  seek  to  draw  them  from  their 
dread  abode. 
His  frailties   there  in  trembling 
hope  repose. 


o 


XL— A  LONG  STOEY. 

The  "  Eleg}^ "  having  been  handed  about  in 
MS.  by  Horace  Walpole  was  seen  by  Lady 
Cobham,  then  residing  at  the  Mansion-house, 
Stoke-Poges  ;  being  anxious  to  make  the  poet's 
acquaintance,  she  learned  from  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Purt  of  Stoke  that  the  poet  lived  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood and  was  Mr.  Gray,  whom  she  did 
not  know.  This  was  in  summer  of  1750,  and 
two  ladies  who  were  stopping  with  her,  Miss 
Speed  and  Lady  Schaub,  on  the  strength  of 
the  latter  knowing  Lady  Brown,  a  friend  of 
Gray's,  called  at  his  aunt's  house,  but  the  poet 


A  LONG  STORY.  351 

was  not  at  home.  He  returned  the  call,  and 
thus  began  his  acquaintance  and  friendship 
with  Lady  Cobham  and  Miss  Speed,  which  re- 
sulted in  his  humorous  account  of  his  introduc- 
tion to  them,  which  he  called  "  A  Long  Story," 
and  his  "  Amatory  Lines  "  and  the  "  Song " 
written  at  the  request  of  Miss  Speed.  See  the 
Notes  on  the  "  Amatory  Lines  "  and  "  Song." 

The  "  Long  Story  "  was  only  once  printed  in 
Gray's  lifetime,  viz.,in  the  edition  with  Bentley's 
"  Designs  "  in  1753.  In  a  letter  to  Dr.  Beattie, 
dated  24th  December,  1767,  Gray  says  he  had 
consented  to  let  Dodsley  reprint  all  he  ever 
published  "  if  he  would  omit  entirely  the  "  Long 
Story"  (which  was  never  meant  for  the  public, 
and  only  suffered  to  appear  in  that  pompous 
edition  because  of  Mr.  Bentley's  designs,  which 
were  not  intelligible  without  it)  " 

There  is  a  copy  of  the  "  Long  Story  "  in  the 
Pembroke  MSS.,  and  in  the  margin,  at  the  top, 
the  date  "  Aug.  1750  "  is  entered. 

1.  The  first  line  of  Parnell's  "  Fairy  Tale  " 
jg  • 

In  Britain's  Isle,  and  Arthur's  days." 

2.  Sir  Edward  Coke's  mansion  at  Stoke- 
Poges,  now  the  seat  of  Mr.  Penn,  was  the  scene 
of  Gray's  "  Long  Story."  The  antique  chim- 
neys have  been  allowed  to  remain  as  vestiges 

'  of  the  Poet's  fancy,  and  a  column  with  a  statue 


352  NOTES. 

of  Coke  marks  the  former  abode  of  its  illus- 
trious inhabitant. — Mitford. 

The  Mr.  Penn  who  bought  the  mansion  on 
the  death  of  Lady  Cobham  in  1760,  was  a  son 
of  William  Penn,  the  founder  of  Pennsylvania, 
and  it  remained  in  the  possession  of  the  Penn 
family  until  1848,  when  it  was  bought  by  the 
Rt.  Hon.  H.  Labouchere  (Baron  Taunton),  and 
by  him  sold  to  Mr.  Edward  Coleman,  from 
whom  it  was  purchased  in  1887  by  Mr.  Wilber- 
force  Bryant.  For  further  information  and 
illustrations  of  Stoke  see  the  "  Universal 
Review  "  for  May,  1889,  and  "  Cathedrals,  Ab- 
beys and  Churches  of  England  and  Wales," 
Cassell  and  Co.,  Part  13. 

2.  Building.  Misprinted  huildings  in  Mr. 
Gosse's  edition. 

11.  The  residence  of  Sir  Christopher  Hatton 
at  Stoke  is  doubted  by  his  biographer.  Sir 
Harris  Nicolas,  who  believes  the  tradition 
originated  in  the  marriage  of  his  widow  with 
Sir  E.  Coke,  to  whom  Stoke  Mansion  belonged, 
and  by  whom  Queen  Elizabeth  was  entertained 
there. 

hrawU  were  a  sort  of  French  figure-dance, 
then  in  vogue.  See  "  England's  Helicon  "  and 
Ben  Jonson's  "  Masque  "  : — 

"  And  thence  did  Venus  learn  to  lead 
The  Idalian  brawls." 


I 


A  LONG  STORY.  353 

29-31.  Miss  Speed,  who,  after  the  death  of 
her  father,  Colonel  Speed,  was  brought  up  in 
the  family  of  Lord  Cobham.  Mason  says  she 
was  a  relation  of  Lady  Cobham's.  See  "  Gray 
and  his  friends."  In  a  letter  to  Martha  Blount, 
July  4,  1739,  Pope  refers  to  Lady  Cobham  and 
Miss  Speed  being  at  Stowe,  the  seat  of  Lord 
Cobham. 

35.  Melissa.  A  beneficent  fairy  invented  by 
the  Italian  poets. 

37.  Gcqnicine,  now  spelt  "  capuchin,"  a  cloak 
with  a  hood  like  that  of  the  monks  of  the  Capu- 
chin order,  so-called  from  their  wearing  this 
garment ;  the  primary  root  is  cajput^  the  head, 
just  as  hood  is  another  form  of  head. 

41.  Mr.  Robert  Purt  was  Fellow  of  King's 
College,  Cambridge,  1738,  assistant  master  at 
Eton,  and  tutor  to  Lord  Baltimore's  son  there ; 
in  1749  he  was  presented  to  the  rectory  of  Set- 
trington  in  Yorkshire.  He  died  in  April,  1752, 
of  the  small-pox. 

"  It  has  been  said  that  this  gentleman,  a 
neighbour  and  acquaintance  of  Gray's  in  the 
country,  was  much  displeased  with  the  liberty 
here  taken  with  his  name  ;  yet,  surely,  with- 
out any  great  reason." — Mason. 

51.  "  Henry  the  Fourth,  in  the  fourth  year 
of  his  reign,  issued  out  the  following  commission 
against  this  species  of  vermin : —  '  And  it  is  en- 


354  NOTES. 

acted,  that  no  master-rimour,  minstrel,  or  other 
vagabond,  be  in  any  wise  sustained  in  the  land 
of  Wales,  to  make  commoiths,  or  gatherings 
upon  the  people  there.'  '  Vagabond,'  says 
Ritson,  '  was  a  title  to  which  the  profession  had 
been  long  accustomed.' 

'  Beggars  tliey  are  with  one  consent, 

And  rogues  by  act  of  parliament.'  " — Mitford. 

56.  bounce,  with  a  sudden  jump ;  an  adverb 
like  whisk,  79. 

67.  "  There  is  a  very  great  similarity,"  says 
Mitford,  "  between  the  style  of  part  of  this 
poem  and  Prior's  '  Dove ; '  as  for  instance  in 
the  following  stanzas,  which  Gray  must  have 
had  in  his  mind  : — 

'  With  one  great  peal  they  rap  the  door 

Like  footmen  on  a  visiting  day  : 
Folks  at  her  house  at  such  an  horn. 

Lord  !  what  will  all  the  neighbours  say  ?  .  .  . 
Her  keys  he  takes,  her  door  unlocks, 

Thro'  wardrobe,  and  thro'  closet  bounces, 
Peeps  into  every  chest  and  box, 

Turns  all  her  furbelows  and  flounces.  .  .  . 
I  marvel  much,  she  smiling  said. 

Your  poultry  cannot  yet  be  found. 
Lies  he  in  yonder  slipper  dead. 

Or  may  be  in  the  tea-pot  drowned  ?  ' " 

80.  a  spell,  a  writing  that  would  have  a  mag- 
ical effect  ;  this  refers  to  the  little  note  that 
the  ladies  left  for  him,  which  was :  — "  Lady 


A  LONG  STORY.  355 

Schaub's  compliments  to  Mr.  Gray ;  she  is 
sorry  not  to  have  found  him  at  home,  to  tell 
him  that  Lady  Brown  is  very  well." 

83,  84.  hirdlime  and  chains,  a  playful  way  of 
describing  the  contents  of  the  note  as  evidently 
written  to  catch  him  like  a  bird,  and  cause  him 
to  come  to  their  house ;  while  the  border  of  the 
paper  is  compared  to  chains  that  will  have  the 
same  effect,  but  are  invisible. 

100.  the  gallery,  the  picture  gallery  ;  we  are 
now  to  suppose  that  the  ladies  in  the  large  por- 
traits, high  dames  of  honour  that  lived  as  long 
ago  as  Queen  Mary's  time,  come  down  from 
their  pictures,  or  their  spirits  appear,  as  they 
often  did  on  dark  nights. 

103.  In  the  elegant  little  edition  of  Gray's 
poems,  published  by  Sharpe,  with  illustrations 
by  Westall,  in  1826,  this  name  is  printed  Tyacke 
in  the  text,  and  there  is  the  following  foot- 
note : — "  Her  name  which  has  hitherto,  in  all 
editions  of  Gray's  Poems,  been  written  Styack, 
is  corrected  from  her  gravestone  in  the  church- 
yard, and  the  accounts  of  contemporary  persons 
in  the  parish.  House-keepers  are  usually  styled 
Mrs. ;  the  final  s  doubtless  caused  the  name  to 
be  misapprehended  and  misspelt."  There  is  a 
similar  manuscript  note  iu  Upcott's  edition, 
1800,  in  the-  British  Museum,  signed  '  P.'. 

It  is  very  probable  that  Gray  mistook  "  Mrs. 


356  NOTES. 

Tyacke  "  for  "  Mrs.  Styacke,"  as  when  he  wrote 
the  "  Long  Story  "  he  had  only  just  become  ac- 
quainted with  Lady  Cobham's  household.  I 
see  no  necessity,  however,  for  altering  the  name 
in  the  text ;  but  the  point  is  worth  recording, 
as  it  has  not  been  referred  to  by  any  other  edi- 
tor  of  Gray.  In  the  edition  published  by 
Bickers  and  Bush,  1858,  '  Tyacke  '  is  the  read- 
ing  in  the  text,  without  note. 

115.  James  Squibb,  son  of  Dr.  Arthur  Squibb, 
chaplain  to  Colonel  Bellasis's  regiment  about 
1685,  attracted  the  notice  of  Lord  Cobham,  in 
whose  service  he  continued  for  many  years, 
and  died  at  Stowe  in  June,  1762. 

116.  Groom.  "  His  grave  is  close  to  that  of 
Tyacke  in  the  south-west  corner  of  the  church- 
yard."—' P.'  in  Upcott's  MS.  Notes. 

120.  From  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  "  for 
1750,  I  find  that  James  Maclean  (wrongly  spelt 
by  Gray),  was  hanged  on  the  3rd  October,  1750 ; 
this  then,  taken  with  Gray's  footnote,  gives  us 
the  date  of  his  finishing  the  poem.  "  Since  the 
27th  of  July,  the  conversation  of  the  town  has 
been  turned  upon  the  gentleman  highwayman." 
He  was  sentenced  to  death  in  September  for 
robbery  in  the  Salisbury  coach,  near  Turnham 
Green,  on  June  26th.  When  he  was  called  to 
receive  sentence,  he  only  said,  "  My  Lord,  I 
cannot  speak.''''     Several  pamphlets  about  him 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC.  357 

are  announced  in  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  " 
for  September,  1750. 

159.  The  ghostly  Prudes^  the  ghosts  of  the 
ladies  in  the  portraits,  hagged.  Mason  has 
the  following  note  :— "  The  face  of  a  witch  or 
hag  ;  the  epithet  haggard  has  been  sometimes 
mistaken  as  conveying  the  same  idea ;  but  it 
means  a  very  different  thing,  viz.,  wild  and 
farouche,  and  is  taken  from  an  unreclaimed 
hawk,  called  an  haggard,  in  which  its  proper 
sense  the  poet  uses  it  finely  on  a  sublime  oc- 
casion. Ode  VI."  See  "  The  Bard,"  18,  and 
the  note. 

135.  the  square  hoods,  the  dames  of  honour 
in  the  portraits,  so-called  from  their  wearing 
square  or  peaked  hoods. 


XII.— ODE  FOR  MUSIC. 

The  full  title  of  this  Ode  explains  the  oc- 
casion of  its  being  written  ;  it  is  : — Ode  |  Per- 
formed in  the  |  Senate-House  at  Cambridge  | 
July  1, 1769,  I  at  the  Installation  of  His  Grace 
Augustus-Henry  Fitzroy  |  Duke  of  Grafton  ( 
Chancellor  of  the  University.  |  Set  to  music 
by  I  Dr.  Randal,  |  Professor  of  Music.  |  Cam- 
bridge  |  Printed  for  J.  Archdeacon  Printer  to 
the  University  |  1769. 


358  NOTES. 

The  Duke  of  Grafton,  as  Prime  Minister,  had 
in  July,  1768,  conferred  on  Gray  the  Professor- 
ship  of  Modern  History  at  Cambridge,  and 
when  he  was  elected  to  succeed,  as  Chancellor, 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  who  died  in  November, 
1768,  Gray  determined  to  show  his  gratitude 
by  writing  the  usual  Installation  Ode.  He  re- 
fers to  it  thus  in  a  letter  of  July  16,  1769,  to 
Dr.  Beattie  (author  of  "The  Minstrel,"):— 
"  1  thought  myself  bound  in  gratitude  to  his 
Grace,  unasked,  to  take  upon  me  the  task  of 
writing  those  verses  which  are  usually  set  to 
music.  I  do  not  think  them  worth  sending 
you,  because  they  are  by  nature  doomed  to  live 
but  a  single  day  ;  or,  if  their  existence  be  pro- 
longed  beyond  that  date  it  is  only  by  means  of 
newspaper  parodies  and  witless  criticism.  This 
sort  of  abuse  I  had  reason  to  expect,  but  do  not 
think  it  worth  while  to  avoid."  And  in  a  note 
to  Mr.  Stonehewer,  the  Duke's  secretary,  to 
whom  he  sent  the  Ode  in  manuscript,  on  the 
12th  June,  for  the  Duke's  perusal,  he  says  : — 
"  I  did  not  intend  the  Duke  should  have  heard 
me  till  he  could  not  help  it.  You  are  desired  to 
make  the  best  excuses  you  can  to  his  Grace  for 
the  liberty  I  have  taken  of  praising  him  to  his 
face,  but  as  somebody  must  necessarily  do  this 
1  did  not  see  why  Gratitude  shoul'd  sit  silent 
and  leave  it  to  Expectation   to  sing,  who  cer- 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC.  359 

tainly  would  have  sung,  and  that  a  gorge  de- 
ploy ee  upon  such  an  occasion." 

It  was  this  Duke  of  Grafton  to  whom 
"  Junius  "  addressed  some  of  his  "  Letters." 
Here  are  two  passages  from  them  in  strong 
contrast  to  Gray's  eulogy  : — "  The  first  uni- 
form principle,  or,  if  I  may  call  it,  the  genius, 
of  your  life  has  carried  you  through  every  pos- 
sible change  and  contradiction  of  conduct, 
without  the  momentary  imputation  or  colour 
of  a  virtue,  and  the  wildest  spirit  of  inconsist- 
ency  has  never  once  betrayed  you  into  a  wise 
or  honourable  action."  And  as  regards  his  de- 
scent from  royalty  he  tells  him  : — "  The  char- 
acter of  the  reputed  ancestors  of  some  men 
has  made  it  possible  for  their  descendants  to 
be  vicious  in  the  extreme  without  being  de- 
generate. Those  of  your  Grace,  for  instance, 
left  no  distressing  example  of  virtue  even  to 
their  legitimate  posterity,  and  you  may  look 
back  with  pleasure  to  an  illustrious  pedigree, 
in  ^vhich  heraldry  has  left  not  one  single  good 
quality  on  record  to  insult  or  upbraid  you." 

In  a  letter  to  the  Duke,  dated  8th  July,  17G9, 
"  Junius  "  refers  to  this  "  Installation  Ode  :  " — 
"even  the  venal  muse^  though  happiest  in 
fiction,  will  forget  your  virtues." 

The  compliments  Gray  paid  the  Duke  in  this 
Ode  led  to  a  parody  on  the  Epitaph  in  the 


860  NOTES. 

"  Elegy,"  in  a  newspaper  in  1769,  which  is  to 
be  found  cut  out  therefrom  and  pasted  on  the 
last  page  of  Vol.  11.  of  Upcott's  edition  of 
Gray  in  the  British  Museum.  The  letter  runs 
as  follows  : — "  As  a  certain  Church-yard  Poet 
has  deviated  from  the  principles  he  once  prof  est, 
it  is  very  fitting  that  the  necessary  alterations 
should  be  made  in  his  Epitaph." — Marcus, 

EPITAPH. 

"  Here  rests  his  head  upon  the  lap  of  earth, 
One  nor  to  fortune  nor  to  fame  unknown  ; 

Fair  science  frown'd  not  on  his  humble  birth, 
And  smooth-tongued  flatt'ry  mark'd  him  for  her 
own. 

Large  was  his  wish — in  this  he  was  sincere — 
Fate  did  a  recompence  as  largely  send, 

Gave  the  poor  C  .  .  r  four  hundred  pounds  a  year. 
And  made  ad..   .  y  Minister  his  friend. 

No  further  seek  his  deeds  to  bring  to  light, 
For,  ah !  he  offer'd  at  Corruption's  shrine  ; 

And  basely  strove  to  wash  an  Ethiop  white, 
While  Truth  and  Honour  bled  in  ev'ry  line." 

Gray  finished  the  Ode  in  April,  1769 ;  it 
was  his  last  poetical  composition,  and  except 
the  Odes  from  the  Norse  and  the  Welsh, 
written  in  1761  and  1764,  he  had  published 
nothing  new  for  twelve  years,  i.  e.,  since  the 
"  Progress  of  Poesy  "  and  the  "  Bard "  ap- 
peared in  1757. 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC.  361 

The  "  Ode  for  the  Installation  "  was  published 
by  the  University  in  quarto,  the  second  title 
beinff  "  Ode  for  Music."  It  was  never  edited 
by  Gray,  and  when  Mason  published  it  in  his 
editions  of  Gray's  Poems,  he  entitled  it  simply 
"For Music,"  and  added,  the  epithet  "Irregu- 
lar "  ;  he  also,  "  for  the  sake  of  uniformity  in 
the  page,  divided  the  Ode  into  stanzas,  and 
discarded  the  musical  divisions  of  Recitative, 
Air,  and  Chorus."  Mason  has  been  followed 
in  most  of  these  changes,  and  in  no  other 
edition  (except  that  edited  by  me  for  Messrs. 
Macraillan  and  Co.)  has  the  Ode  been  correctly 
printed,  as  now,  with  the  divisions,  etc.,  as  it 
appeared  when  first  published. 

A  still  more  noteworthy  point  is  that  Gray 
has  been  credited  with  some  of  Mason's  work. 
There  were  no  notes  in  the  University  edition 
of  the  Ode,  but  Mason  wrote  notes  in  the 
manner  of  the  historical  notes  which  Gray 
wrote  for  the  "  Bard,"  and  placed  them  as 
footnotes  to  the  Ode  in  his  edition  of  1775, 
and  Graj^'s  notes  on  the  other  poems  as  foot- 
notes in  their  proper  places ;  he  also  had  ad- 
ditional notes  of  his  own  as  an  appendix. 
With  the  exception  of  Matbias,  every  editor  of 
Gray  concluded  that  the  footnotes  to  the  Ode 
were  by  Gray,  and  all  the  notes  which  I  have 
marked  Mason,  from  line  41  to  84,  are  in  all 


362  NOTES. 

other  editions  (except  Mathias')  marked  Gray, 
The  note  on  "  Elizabeth  de  Burg  "  ought  to 
have  led  them  to  susjiect  that  the  reference  to 
"  the  poet  "  was  not  by  Gray  ;  still  stranger  is 
it  that  it  has  escaped  so  many  editors  to  the 
present  day  that  Mason  states  in  the  appendix 
that  the  notes  are  by  himself  : — "  I  have  added," 
he  says,  "  at  the  bottom  of  the  page  a  number 
of  explanatory  notes,  which  this  Ode  seemed 
to  want  still  more  than  that  which  preceded  it 
[the  "  Bard  "] ;  especially  when  given  not  to 
the  University  only,  but  the  public  in  general, 
who  may  be  reasonably  supposed  to  know  little 
of  the  particular  founders  of  different  colleges 
and  their  history  here  alluded  to." 

4.  Sloth  of  pallid  hue.  Contrast  this  with 
the  "  rosy  hue,  and  lively  cheer  of  vigour 
born,"  "  Ode  on  Eton,"  45,  47. 

14.  W  indignant  lay,  the  previous  verses 
which  the  poet  feigns  to  have  heard  said  by 
sages  and  bards  as  they  look  down  on  their  old 
University,  "  indignant "  lest  Comus,  Igno- 
rance, etc.,  should  profane  the  "  holy  ground." 

21.  their  opening  soul,  their  minds  when,  as 

students  there,  they  were  expanding.    Of.  in 

Gray's  "  Education  and  Government "  : — 

"  Spread  the  young  thought,  and  warm  the  opening 
heart."— \2 

25.  Meek.     Sir  Isaac  Newton,  though  one  of 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC.  363 

the  greatest  philosophers  that  ever  lived,  had 
an  humble  opinion  of  his  knowledge.  He  was 
born  in  1642  and  died  in  1727,  aged  85,  hence 
here  spoken  of  as  "  hoary."  He  was  twenty- 
five  years  old  when  "  Paradise  Lost "  was 
published  in  1667.  According  to  Dr.  Whe- 
well  he  resided  at  Trinity  College  for  thirty- 
five  years  without  the  interruption  of  a  single 
month. 

27-34.  "  This  stanza,  being  supposed  to  be 
sung  by  Milton,  is  very  judiciously  written  in 
the  metre  which  he  fixed  upon  for  the  stanza 
of  his  Christmas  Hymn  ;  "  'Twas  in  the  winter 
wild,"  etc. — Mason.  It  is  also  w^ritten  in  the 
language  of  Milton,  his  very  words  as  well  as 
thoughts  and  manner  being  adopted  : — 

"  when  the  sun  begins  to  fling 
His  flaring  beams,  me,  Goddess,  bring 
To  arched  walks  of  twilight  groves, 
And  shadows  brown." — II  Penseroso,  131-134. 

"  By  the  rushy-fringed  bank. 
Where  grows  the  unlloiv  and  the  osier  dank." 

— Comus,  890. 

"  Next  Camus,  reverend  sire,  went  footing  slow." 

Lycidas,  103. 

"  Together  both,  ere  the  high  lawns  appeared 
Under  the  opening  eyelids  of  the  morn 
We  drove  afield."— i6.  25,  26. 

[In  the  above  lines  Milton  refers  to  his  life  at 
Cambridge.] 


364  NOTES. 

"  After  short  bliish  of  morn.'"— Par.  Lost,  xi.  185. 

•'  The  shepherds  on  the  laivn, 

Or  ere  the  point  of  daivn." — Christmas  Hymn,  85. 

"  I  did  not  err  ;  there  dees  a  sable  cloud 
Turn  forth  her  silver  lining  on  the  night, 
And  casts  a  gleam  over  this  tufted  grove." 

— Comus,  223. 

"  The  Cherub  Contemplation 

And  the  mute  Silence  hist  along,  .... 

While  Cynthia  checks  her  dragon  yoke 

Gently  o'er  the  accustomed  oak. 

Sweet  bird,  that  shunnest  the  noise  of  folly, 

Most  musical,  most  melancholy." 

— U  Penseroso,  54-62, 

"  But  let  my  due  feet  never  fail 

To  walk  the  studious  cloister's  pale." — lb.  155-156. 

29.  willowy.  With  willows  growing  on  the 
banks ;  cf.  "  rushy  brink,"  "  Ode  on  Spring," 
15  ;  and  his  "  Hymn  to  Ignorance  "  : 

"  Where  rushy  Camus'  sloivly-ivinding  flood," 

35.  the  portals  sound,  i.  e.,  the  doors  are  opened 
Portals  occurs  only  twice  in  "  Paradise  Lost," 
iii.  508,  vii.  575,  and  in  each  place  refers  to  the 
gates  of  heaven  ;  and  in  this  sense  Gray  uses  it 
again  in  his  lines  in  the  epitaph  on  Mrs.  Mason. 

39.  "  Edward  the  Third,  who  added  ihefleur- 
de-lys  of  France  to  the  arms  of  England.  He 
founded  Trinity  CoWq^q.^^— Mason,  Mitford 
quotes  from  Denham  : — 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC.  365 

"  Oreat  Edioard,  and  thy  greater  son, 
He  that  the  lilies  wore,  and  he  that  won." 

41.  "  Mary  de  Valentia,  Countess  of  Pem- 
broke, daughter  of  Guy  de  Chatillon,  Comte  de 
St.  Paul  in  France  ;  of  whom  tradition  says 
that  her  husband,  Audemar  de  Yalentia,  Earl  of 
Pembroke,  was  slain  at  a  tournament  on  the 
day  of  his  nuptials.  She  was  the  foundress  of 
Pembroke  College  or  Hall,  under  the  name  of 
Aula  Marios  de  Yalentia." — Mason. 

42.  "  Elizabeth  de  Burg,  Countess  of  Clare, 
was  wife  of  John  de  Burg,  son  and  heir  of  the 
Earl  of  Ulster,  and  daughter  of  Gilbert  de  Clare, 
Earl  of  Gloucester,  by  Joan  de  Acres,  daughter 
of  Edward  the  First.  Hence  the  poet  gives 
her  the  epithet  of  '  princely.'  She  founded 
Clara  Hall."    Mason. 

43.  "  Margaret  of  Anjou,  wife  of  Henry  the 
Sixth,  foundress  of  Queen's  College.  The  poet 
has  celebrated  her  conjugal  fidelity  in  the 
former  Ode  ('The  Bard,'  %^:'— Mason,  the 
paler  Rose.  "  Elizabeth  Widville,  wife  of  Ed- 
ward the  Fourth,  hence  called  the  paler  rose, 
as  being  of  the  House  of  York.  She  added  to 
the  foundation  of  Margaret  of  Anjou." — Mason. 

45.  "  Henry  the  Sixth  and  Eighth.  The  for- 
mer the  founder  of  King's,  the  latter  the  great- 
est  benefactor  to  Trinity  College." — Maso^i. 
eitlier.     Each,  the  one  and  the  other  ;  either  is 


22— G  &  G— DD 


366  NOTES. 

properly  one  of  two  ;  but  in  old  writers  and 

in  poetry  is  used  for  each  of  two  : — 

"  In  either  hand  the  hastening  angel  caught 
Our  lingering  parents." — Par.  Lost,  xii.  637. 

61-64.  These  lines  may  be  based  on  that  well- 
known  passage  in  "  Paradise  Lost,"  in  which  Eve 
says  to  Adam  : — 

"  Sweet  is  the  breath  of  Morn,  her  rising  sweet  ; 
....  fragrant  the  fertile  earth 
After  soft  showers  ;  and  sweet  the  coming  on 

Of  grateful  evening  mild 

But  neither  breath  of  Morn, 

....  without  thee  is  sweet." — iv.  641-656. 

Another  passage  recalled  by  both  is  Byron's 

"  'Tis  sweet  to  see  the  evening  star  appear  .... 
'Tis  sweet  to  know  there  is  an  ej'e  will  mark 
Our  coming,  and  look  brighter  when  we  come." 

— Don  Juan. 

65.  her  golden  cloud,  her  abode  in  heaven  ; 

so  in  "  Paradise  Lost,"  vi.  28  : — 

"  from  whence  a  voice, 
From  midst  a  golden  cloud,  thus  mild  was  heard." 

66.  "  Countess  of  Richmond  and  Derby  ;  the 
mother  of  Henry  the  Seventh,  foundress  of  St. 
John's  and  Christ's  College." — Mason. 

70.  "  The  Countess  was  a  Beaufort,  and 
married  to  a  Tudor  ;  hence  the  application  of 
this  line  to  the  Duke  of  Grafton,  who  claims 
descent  from  both  these  families." — Mason. 

In  the  volume  in  the  British  Museum  (No. 


ODE  FOR  MUSIC. 


367 


840,  1.  5)  which  contains  Gray's  "  Odes,"  Ed. 
1757,  there  is,  in  neat  handwriting  on  a  fly-leaf 
at  the  end,  the  following  genealogical  tree 
drawn  out  to  illustrate  the  lines, 

"  Pleased  in  thy  lineaments,  we  trace 
A  Tudor's  fire,  a  Beaufort's  grace." 

John  Beaufort,  Duke  of  Somerset, 
Grandson  to  John  of  Gaunt. 


Edmund 

TUDOR,- 


*'  The  venerable 
-Margaret." 


Earl  of  Richmond. 


who  founded  Clu-ist's  College,  St. 
John's,  etc. 


Henry  VII.  Margaret  Tudor, 

wife  of  James  IV.  of  Scotland. 

James  V.  of  Scotland. 

Mary,  Queen  of  Scots. 

I 
James  VI.  of  Scotland, 
and  I.  of  Gt.  Britain. 

Charles  I. 

Charles  II. 

Henry  Fitzroy,  1st  Duke  of  Grafton, 
born  1663,  died  1690. 
Charles  Fitzroy,  2nd  Duke  of  Grafton, 
born  1683,  died  1757. 


George,  Earl  of  Euatou, 
died  1747. 


Ld.  Augustus  Fitzroy, 
died  1741. 


Augustus  Henry  Fitzroy,  3rd  Duke  of 

Grafton,  born  1736,  installed  Chancellor 

of  Cambridge,  July  1,  1769. 


368  NOTES. 

75.  the  latent  gem^  the  gem  that  lies  hid. 
The  stanza  means  "  Thy  discriminating  eye 
will  find  out  men  of  genius,  Avho  would  other- 
wise be  unknown,  and  will  raise  them  to  places 
of  honour  and  usefulness."  He  reproduces  his 
simile  of  the  "  gem  and  the  flower  "  from  the 
"  Elegy,"  53-56. 

78.  This  line  is  taken  from  Adam's  descrip- 
tion of  Eve  ("  Paradise  Lost,"  viii.  504)  :— 
"  Not  obvious,  not  obtrusive,  but  retired." 

84.  "  Lord  Treasurer  Burleigh  was  Chancel- 
lor of  the  University  in  the  reign  of  Queen 
Elizabeth." — Mason. 

laureate  wreath  is  from  Milton — "  "Worces- 
ter's laureate  wreath,''  "  Sonnet  to  Cromwell." 

89.  The   words  of  Milton  again,  "Comus," 

87:— 

"  Well  knows  to  still  the  wild  winds  when  they  roar." 

92.  This  means  "  guid6  the  ship  of  state 
safely,"  in  allusion  to  the  Duke  being  Prime 
Minister  ;  the  idea  is  from  Horace  : — 

"  Neque  altum 
Semper  urgendo,  neque,  dum  procellas 
Cantus  horrescis,  nimium  premendo 
Littus  iniquum. — Odes,  ii.  10. 

93.  The  Star  of  BrunswicJc,  etc.  This  is  a 
double  compliment  to  the  King  and  to  the 
Prime  Minister.  "  The  star  that  guides  your 
royal  master  is  now  in   the  ascendant,  and 


AGRIPPINA.  369 

shines  brightly  to  guide  you  in  steering  the 
ship  of  state."  Mitford  refers  to  Pope, "  Essay 
on  Criticism  "  : — 

"  The  mighty  Stagyrite  first  left  the  shore 
Spread  all  his  sails,  and  durst  the  deeps  explore  ; 
He  steered  securely,  and  discovered  far, 
Led  by  the  light  of  the  Moeonian  star." — 645. 


POSTHUMOUS  POEMS. 

XIII.— AGRIPPINA. 

"  Agrippina  "  was  begun  in  London  in  De- 
cember, 1741.  The  first  scene  was  sent  to  West 
in  Hertfordshire  about  31st  March,  1742,  with 
the  following  remarks  : — "  I  take  the  liberty  of 
sending  you  a  long  speech  of  Agrippina ;  much 
too  long,  but  I  could  be  glad  you  would  re- 
trench it.  Aceronia,  you  may  remember,  had 
been  giving  quiet  counsels.  I  fancy,  if  it  ever 
be  finished,  it  will  be  in  the  nature  of  Nat.  Lee's 
'  Bedlam  Tragedy,'  which  had  twenty-five 
acts  and  some  odd  scenes."  On  the  4th  April 
West  wrote  in  reply,  "I  own,  in  general,  I 
think  Agrippina's  speech  too  long ;  but  how 
to  retrench  it  1  know  not.  But  I  have  some- 
thing else  to  say,  and  that  is  in  relation  to  the 
style,  which  appears  to  me  too  antiquated." 


370  NOTES. 

Gray  replied  defending  his  style,  observing, 
"  the  language  of  the  age  is  never  the  lan- 
guage of  poetry ;  except  among  the  French, 
whose  verse,  where  the  thought  or  image  does 
not  support  it,  dilfers  in  nothing  from  prose. 
Our  poetry,  on  the  contrary,  has  a  language 
peculiar  to  itself,  to  which  almost  every  one 
that  has  written  has  added  something  by  en- 
riching it  with  foreign  idioms  and  derivatives, 
nay  sometimes  words  of  their  own  composition 
or  invention.  Shakespeare  and  Milton  have 
been  great  creators  this  way." 

To  this  West  replied  in  a  very  interesting 
letter  ;  and  in  his  next  letter  Gray  dismisses 
the  subject  thus  :  "  As  to  Agrippina,  I  begin  to 
be  of  your  opinion,  and  find  myself  (as  women 
of  their  children)  less  enamoured  of  my  pro- 
ductions the  older  they  grow.  She  is  laid  up 
to  sleep  till  next  summer,  so  bid  her  good- 
night." 

Gray  never  resumed  it ;  possibly  West's  death 
made  him  unwilling  to  take  up  again  what  had 
been  a  subject  of  interest  to  each ;  also,  as  he 
told  Norton  Nicholls,  the  labour  of  polishing  a 
long  poem  would  be  intolerable.  Gray  thought 
the  first  ten  or  twelve  lines  of  "Agrippina" 
the  best,  but  West  preferred  the  last  fourteen 
in  the  first  scene. 

This  fragment  no  longer  exists  in  Gray's  MS. 


AGRIPPINA.  371 

35.  flattery's  incense,  cf.  the  "  Elegy,"  71,  72  ; 
«  Ode  for  Music,"  79. 

38.  Cf.  the  "  Elegy,"  118. 

42.  Writing  to  Stonehewer  ■when  sending 
the  "  Ode  for  Music  "  for  the  perusal  of  the  Duke 
of  Grafton,  Gray  says :  "  I  did  not  see  why 
Gratitude  should  sit  silent  and  leave  it  to  Ex- 
pectation to  sing,  who  certainly  would  have 
sung  and  that  a  gorge  deploy ee  upon  such  an 
occasion." 

83.  Madding.     Cf.  "  Elegy,"  73. 

94.  Cf.  "  Progress  of  Poesy,"  53. 

98.  Cf.  Shakespeare's  "  Henry   V."  ii.    Cho- 

rus  : — 

"  And  silken  dalliance  in  the  wardrobe  lies." 

114.  Old  respect  is  from  Milton,  "  Samson 
Agonistes,"  333. 

124.  Spirit-stirring.    Cf.  "  Othello,"  iii.  3  :— 

"The  spirit-stirring  drum,  the  ear-piercing  fife." 

147.  See  the  "  Bard,"  G9. 

149.  gorgeous  p>hrase,  cf.  '  gorgeous  Trag- 
edy,'  "  II  Penseroso,"  97. 

154.  fruitless^  cf.  "  Sonnet  on  the  Death  of 
West,"  13. 

165.  Cf.  Pope's  "  Prologue  to  the  Satires  "  :— 

"  Whom  have  I  hurt  ?  has  poet  yet  or  peer 
Lost  tlie  arched  brows  or  Parnassian  sneer  ?  "—95. 

188.   elusive,  cf.  "  Ode  on  Eton,"  29  and  Note. 


372  NOTES. 


XIV.— SONNET  ON"  THE  DEATH  OF 
KICHARD  WEST. 

This  is  one  of  Gray's  earliest  original  pro- 
ductions in  English  verse,  the  first  being  the 
first  scene  of  "Agrippina,"  sent  to  West  in 
March,  1T42 ;  the  next  was  the  "  Ode  on  the 
Spring,"  sent  to  West  in  June  ;  and  then  this 
Sonnet,  written  at  Stoke  in  August. 

There  is  a  copy  of  this  Sonnet  in  Gray's 
handwriting  in  his  Commonplace  Books,  in 
Pembroke  College. 

It  is  remarkable  that  since  the  Sonnets  of 
Milton  (1642-1655)  there  had  been  no  Sonnets 
that  have  survived,  except  a  single  one  by  Walsh 
"  On  Death  "  (see  my  "  English  Anthology," 
p.  236),  more  than  fifty  years  before  this  of 
Gray's  which,  moreover,  was  not  published 
till  Mason's  "  Life  of  Gray  "  in  1175. 

This  Sonnet  possesses  an  additional  interest 
from  the  use  made  of  it  by  Wordsworth  in  the 
Preface  to  his  "  Lyrical  Ballads  "  (1800),  in  il- 
lustration of  his  assertion  that  "  there  neither 
is  nor  can  be  any  essential  difference  between 
the  language  of  prose  and  metrical  composi- 
tion "  ;  and  on  account  of  Coleridge's  criticism 
of  Wordsworth's  theory,  and  of  the  Sonnet 


ON  THE  DEATH  OF  RICHARD  WEST.     373 

itself,  in  his   "  Biographia  Literaria "  (1817), 
chap,  xviii. 

1.  smiling.  Milton  three  times  speaks  of  the 
"  smiling  morn,"  "  Paradise  Lost,"  v.  124, 168 ; 
xi.  175. 

3.  amorous  descant  is  from  Milton,  "  Para- 
dise Lost,"  iv.  603  :— 

"  all  but  the  wakeful  nightingale  ; 
She  all  night  long  her  amorous  descant  sung." 

4.  attire.  Milton  also  uses  this  word  of  the 
clothing  of  the  fields  : — 

"  Earth  in  her  rich  attire 
Consummate  lovely  smiled." — Par.  Lost,  vii.  501. 

8.  imperfect,  incomplete,  because  he  no  longer 
has  his  friend  to  share  them. 

14.  "  A  similar  line  occurs  in  Gibber's  Alter- 
ation of  '  Richard  the  Third  ' : — 

'  So  we  must  weep,  because  we  weep  in  vain.'  — ii.  8. 

*  Solon,  when  he  wept  for  his  son's  death, 
on  one  saying  to  him,  '  Weeping  will  not  help,' 
answered :  '  I  weep  for  that  very  cause,  that 
weeping  will  not  avail.'  It  is  also  told  of 
Augustus.  See  also  Fitzgeoffry's  '  Life  and 
Death  of  Sir  Francis  Drake'  : — 

'  Oh  I  therefore  do  we  plain'^, 
And  therefore  weepe  because  we  weepe  in  vaine.' " 

— Mitford. 


374 


NOTES. 


XY.— HYMN  TO  IGNORANCE. 

This,  as  may  be  inferred  from  line  11,  was 
written  on  Gray's  return  to  Cambridge,  to  reside 
there,  in  the  winter  of  1742. 

The  title  was  given  by  Mason  who  states : — 
"  I  find  among  his  papers  a  small  fragment  of 
verse  ; ...  it  seems  to  have  been  intended  as  a 
Hymn  or  Address  to  Ignorance,  and,  I  presume, 
had  he  proceeded  with  it,  would  have  con- 
tained much  good  satire  upon  false  science  and 
scholastic  pedantry." 

2.  fanes,  see  "  Ode  for  Music,"  53. 

3.  rushy  Camus.  Cf.  Milton,  "  Elegia  " 
I.:— 

Jam  nee  arundiferm  mihi  cura  revisere  Camum. — 11. 

4.  Also  from  Milton,  "  Paradise  Lost,"  viii. 

306:— 

"  Where  rivers  now 
Stream,  and  perpetual  draw  their  humid  train." 

36.  In  Young's  "Love  of  Fame,"  Sat.  5, 
Philips'  "  Blenheim,"  and  Pope's  "  Temple  of 
Fame,"  there  are  similar  references  to  Se- 
sostris : — 

"  As  CTirst  Sesostris,  proud  Egyptian  King, 
That  monarchs  harnessed  to  his  chariot  yoked." 

—J.  Phtt.tps. 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT  375 

"  High  on  his  car,  Sesostris  struck  my  view, 
Whom  sceptred  slaves  in  golden  harness  drew." 

—Pope. 

38.  It  has  not  been  noted  before  that  in  the 
Pembroke  MSS.  after  the  asterisks  after  this 
line  there  is  the  following  : — 

"  The  ponderous  waggon  lumbered  slowly  on.  "  .... 


XYL— THE  ALLIANCE  OF  EDUCATION 
AND  GOVERNMENT. 

The  first  fifty-seven  lines  of  this  poem  were 
sent  from  Stoke,  in  August,  1748,  in  a  letter  to 
Dr.  "Wharton,  which  concludes  as  follows: — 
"  I  fill  up  with  the  beginning  of  a  sort  of 
Essay  ;  what  name  to  give  it  I  know  not,  but 
the  subject  is  the  Alliance  of  Education  and 
Government ;  I  mean  to  show  that  they  must 
necessarily  concur  to  produce  great  and  useful 
men.  I  desire  your  judgment  upon  so  far  be- 
fore I  proceed  any  further.  Pray  show  it  to 
no  one  (as  it  is  a  fragment)  except  it  be  Stone- 
hewer,  who  has  seen  most  of  it  already,  I 
think."  Mason  says,  "  he  was  busily  employed 
in  it  at  the  time  when  M.  de  Montesquieu's 
book  '  L'Esprit  dec  Lois'  was  first  published. 
On   reading  it  he  found  the  Baron  had  fore- 


376  NOTES. 

stalled  some  of  his  best  thoughts  ;  .  .  .  yet  the 
two  writers  differ  a  little  in  one  very  material 
point,  viz.,  the  influence  of  soil  and  climate  on 
national  manners.  Some  time  after,  he  had 
thoughts  of  resuming  his  plan,  and  of  dedicat- 
ing it,  by  an  introductory  ode,  to  M.  de  Mon. 
tesquieu,  but  that  great  man's  death,  which  hap- 
pened in  1755,  made  him  drop  his  design 
finally." 

In  a  note  to  his  Koman  History,  Gibbon 
says  :  "  Instead  of  compiling  tables  of  chro- 
nology and  natural  history,  why  did  not  Mr. 
Gray  apply  the  powers  of  his  genius  to  finish  the 
philosophic  poem  of  which  he  has  left  such  an 
exquisite  specimen  ?  "  Yol.  iii.  p.  248.  "Would 
it  not  have  been  more  philosophical  in  Gibbon 
to  have  lamented  the  situation  in  which  Gray 
was  placed ;  which  was  not  only  not  very 
favourable  to  the  cultivation  of  poetry,  but 
which  naturally  directed  his  thoughts  to  those 
learned  inquiries,  that  formed  the  amusement 
or  business  of  all  around  him  ? — Mitford. 

2.  Flinty.  This  and  the  other  words  which 
Mr.  Gosse  (in  the  footnotes  to  pages  113-115  of 
vol.  i.  of  his  edition  of  Gray's  "  Works  ")  attrib- 
utes to  Mason  are  really  Gray's,  as  may  be 
seen  in  the  Pembroke  MSS.,  where  the  whole  of 
this  poem  is  in  Gray's  handwriting  and  as 
given  by  Mason  except  in  line  106. 


EDUCATION  AND  GOVERNMENT.         37^ 

9.  "  Yitales  auras  carpis." — Yirg.  jEneid^  i. 

387. 

12.  Opening  heart.    See  "  Ode  for  Music,"  21. 

14.  "  And  lavish  Nature  laughs  and  throws 
her  stores  around." — Dryden,  Virgil^  vii.  76. 

17.  Scatter  ....  plenty.  Cf .  the  "  Elegy," 
63. 

19,  21.  Tyranmj  has, — he  first  wrote  "  gloomy- 
sway  have,"  and  for  "  blooming  "  he  had  "  ver- 
nal." 

48.  sweeping  sway,  cf .  the  "  Bard,"  75,  and 
note. 

56.  Cf.     "gathered    fragrance,"    "Ode    on 
Spring,"  10,  and  Milton,  "  Arcades,"  32  :— 
"  And  ye,  ye  breathing  roses  of  the  wood." 

66.  Rogers  refers  to  Dryden's  "  Religio 
Laici "  : — 

•'  And  as  these  nightly  tapers  disappear, 

When  day's  bright  lord  ascends  our  hemisphere." 

Eve  should  be"  ev'n,"  the  reading  in  the 
Pembroke  MS. 

103.  Jlings,  cf.  the  use  of  "  fling,"  "  Ode  on 
Spring,"  10. 

105.  drive,  etc.    Cf.  "Paradise   Lost,"   iiL 

438:— 

"  Where  Chineses  drive 
With  sails  and  wind  their  cany  waggons  light." 

106.  distant.     Mason  has  '  neigh b'ring.' 


3Y8  NOTES. 

And  gospel-light.  In  the  short  notice  of 
Gray  by  Horace  Walpole,  prefixed  to  Mitford's 
"  Correspondence  of  Gray  and  Mason,"  he  says 
he  began  a  poem  on  the  reformation  of  learn- 
ing, but  soon  dropped  it  on  finding  his  plan  too 
much  resembling  the  "  Dunciad."  It  had  this 
admirable  line  in  it — 

"  When  gospel-light,"  etc. 

"Walpole  seems  to  have  quoted  from  memory  ; 
the  couplet  does  not  occur  in  the  "  Hymn  to 
Ignorance,"  to  which  he  refers,  nor  yet  in  the 
poem  before  us,  but  among  the  papers  in  which 
Mason  found  the  plan  in  prose  of  this  poem. 

"Walpole  imitated  the  couplet  in  an  inscrip- 
tion on  a  Gothic  column  to  Queen  Catherine  : — 

"  From    Katherine's    wrongs    a    nation's    bliss    was 

spread, 
And  Luther's  light  from  Henry's  lawless  bed." 


XYIL— STANZAS  TO  MR  BENTLEY. 

These  verses  were  written  in  1752  as  a  com- 
pliment to  Bentley  for  drawing  the  designs  for 
the  "  Six  Poems  "  of  1753. 

3.  Bentley.  This  Kichard  Bentley  was  a  son 
of  the  celebrated  critic,  sister-art.  Painting 
and  poetry  are  often  spoken  of  as  sister-arts  ^ 


STANZAS  TO  MR.  BENTLEY.  379 

thus  Dryden  to  Kneller,  "  Our  arts  are  sisters,  " 
"  Long  time  the  sister-arts  in  iron  sleep."  And 
Pope,  "  Epistle  to  Jervas  "  : — 

"Smit  with  the  love  of  sister-arts  we  came, 
And  met  congenial,  mingling  flame  with  flame." 

—13. 

And  in  the  title  of  Dryden's  Ode  "  To  the 
Memory  of  Mrs.  Anne  Killigrew,"  she  is  de- 
scribed as  "  Excellant  in  the  two  sister  arts  of 
Poesy  and  Painting. " 

7,  8.  "■  Thence  endless  streams  of  fair  ideas  flow. 

Strike  on  the  sketch,  or  in  the  picture  glow." 
— Pope,  Epistle  to  Jervas,  43. 

"  When  life  aivaJces  and  dawns  at  every  line." 

—lb.  4. 

17-20.  Gray  was  the  favourite  poet  of  the  late 
Earl  of  Carlisle.  The  bust  of  Gray  in  the  upper 
school-room  in  Eton  College  was  presented  by 
him ;  he  delivered  an  admirable  lecture  on  the 
writings  of  Gray  at  the  Sheffield  Institute,  in 
December,  1852,  which  is  published  in  the  Eton 
edition  of  Gray's  "  Poems  ; "  and  on  another 
occasion  I  heard  him  recite  this  stanza  with 
much  feeling. 

20.  Luke  quotes  from  Dryden  : — 

"  Heaven,  that  but  once  was  prodigal  before, 
To  Shakespeare  gave  as  much,  she  could  not  give 
him  more.  "—To  my  Friend,  Mr.  Congreve. 

21-24.  The  thought  in  this  stanza  and  the 


380  NOTES. 

remarkable  expression  "  luxury  of  light "  occur 
in  Gray's  translation  of  a  passage  in  Tasso, 
which  he  made  while  a  student  in  Cambridge 
in  1738.     The  lines  are  : — 

"  The  diamond  there  attracts  the  wondering  sight, 
Proud  of  its  thousand  dies,  and  luxury  of  light." 

Mitford,  in  his  "  Life  of  Gray,"  in  the  Eton  edi- 
tion, tells  us  he  remembers  hearing  Dr.  Edward 
Clarke,  when  Professor  of  Mineralogy,  finish 
one  of  his  lectures  with  the  eight  concluding 
lines  of  this  translation  of  Tasso,  and  rest  on 
the  beautiful  expression  in  the  last  line,  quoted 
above,  with  peculiar  enunciation. 

26.  The  corner  of  the  last  stanza  of  the  only 
existing  MS.  was  torn  off  when  Mason  found  it, 
and  these  stanzas  are  incomplete.  Mason  filled 
up  the  blanks  thus,  observing  that  he  was  "  not 
quite  satisfied  with  the  words  inserted  in  the 
third  line"  : — 

"  Enough  for  me,  if  to  some  feeling  breast 
My  lines  a  secret  sympathy  impart ; 

And  as  their  pleasing  influence  flows  confest, 
A.  sigh  of  soft  reflection  heaves  the  heart." 

Mitford  says  : — "  I  do  not  consider  that  he 
has  been  successful  in  the  selection  of  the  few 
words  which  he  had  added  to  supply  the  im- 
perfect lines :  my  own  opinion  is,  that  Gray 
had  in  his  mind  Dryden's  '  Epistle  to  Kneller,' 


PLEASURE  ARISING  FROM  VICISSITUDE.    381 

from  which  he  partly  took  his  expressions ; 
under  the  shelter  of  that  supposition,  I  shall 
venture  to  give  another  reading  : — 

'  Enough  for  me,  if  to  some  feeling  breast 
My  lines  a  secret  sympathy  convey ; 

And  as  their  pleasing  influence  is  exjyrest, 
A  sigh  of  soft  reflection  dies  away.'  " 


XYIIL— ODE  ON  THE  PLEASUKE 
ARISING  FROM  VICISSITUDE. 

This  Ode  was  left  unfinished  by  Gray ;  it  was 
first  published  by  Mason  in  his  "  Memoirs  "  of 
Gray,  1775,  and  he  "  had  the  boldness  to  at- 
tempt to  finish  it  himself,  making  use  of  some 
other  lines  and  broken  stanzas  which  Gray  had 
written."  Almost  every  editor  of  Gray's 
"  Poems"  has  reprinted  this  Ode  as  defaced  by 
Mason. 

Gray  wrote  what  we  have  of  this  Ode  prob- 
ably in  the  winter  of  175-i-55.  In  a  letter 
to  Dr.  Wharton,  dated  9th  March,  1755,  he 
speaks  of  his  objection  to  publishing  the  Ode 
on  the  "  Progress  of  Poesy  "  alone  ;  and  adds : 
— "  I  have  two  or  three  ideas  more  in  my  head ;  " 
"  one  of  these,"  says  Mason,  "  was  unquestion- 
ably this  Ode,— since  I  found  in  his  memo- 
randum book,  of  1754,  a  sketch  of  his  design  as 


382  NOTES. 

follows  : — Contrast  between  the  winter  past 
and  coming  spring. — Joy  owing  to  that  vicissi- 
tude.— Many  that  never  feel  that  delight. — 
Sloth. — Envy. — Ambition.  How  much  happier 
the  rustic  that  feels  it,  though  he  knows  not 
how." 

13-16.  Cf.  Word  worth's  "  To  a  Skylark  "  ;— 

"  To  the  last  point  of  vision,  and  beyond, 
Mount,  daring  warbler  ! — that  love-prompted 

strain  .  .  . 
Tlirills  not  the  less  the  bosom  of  the  plain." 

17.  "  I  have  heard  Gray  say,  that  Gresset's 
"  Epitre  a  ma  Soeur  "  gave  him  the  first  idea  of 
this  Ode ;  and  whoever  compares  it  with  the 
French  poem  will  find  some  slight  traits  of  re- 
semblance, but  chiefly  in  our  author's  seventh 
stanza." — Mason. 

Mitford   quotes   the    following   lines    from 

Gresset : — 

"  Mon  ame,  trop  long  tems  fletrie 
Va  de  nouveau  s'epanouir  ; 
Et  loin  de  toute  reverie 

Voltiger  avec  le  Zephire, 
Occupe  tout  entier  du  soin  plaisir  d'etre,"  etc. 

29-36.  This  stanza  is  an  expansion  of  lines 
25-28  ;  beasts  and  birds  have  no  yesterday  or 
to-morrow,  but  man  has  both  Reflection  and 
Hope. 

45-52.  This  is  one  of  the  finest  stanzas  in 
Gray's  poetry,  and  is  quite  distinct  in   tone 


PLEASURE  ARISING  FROM  VICISSITUDE,    383 

from  the  artificial  poetry  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  resembling  in  sentiment  and  in  the 
ring  of  the  verse  Wordsworth's  "  Intimations 
of  Immortality,"  the  last  lines  of  -which  may 
have  been  borrowed  in  part  from  this  passage 
of  Gray : 

"  To  me  the  meanest  flower  that  blows  can  give 
Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears." 

55.  crystalline^  a  Miltonic  word,  "  crystalline 
sphere,"  "  Par.  Lost,"  iii.  482  ;  "  the  crystal- 
line sky,"  vi.  772 ;  the  "  crystalline  ocean,"  vii. 
271 ;  "  cool  crystalline  stream,"  "  Samson  Ago- 
nistes,"  546. 

The  following  incomplete  lines  are  in  Gray's 
MS.  Mason  filled  up  the  gaps,  and  added 
three  stanzas  more. 

"  Far  below  the  crowd, 

Where  broad  and  turbulent  it  grows 

with  resistless  sweep 
They  perish  in  the  boundless  deep. 
Mark  where  Indolence  and  Pride, 
Softly  rolling,  side  by  side. 
Their  dull,  but  daily  round." 


XIX.—EPITAPH  ON  MRS.  CLAPKE. 

This  epitaph  is  on  a  mural  tablet  of  slate  and 
marble  in  the  Church  at  Beckenham,  Kent, 
The  inscription  is — 


384  NOTES. 

"  Jane  Claeke 
Died  April  27,  1757.    Aged  31." 

and  then  follow  the  verses  in  two  columns. 

The  epitaph  was  first  printed  in  the  "  Gentle- 
man's Magazine  "  for  October,  1774. 

Mason's  note  is :  "  This  Lady,  the  wife  of 
Dr.  Clarke,  Physician  at  Epsom,  died  April  27, 
1757,  and  is  buried  in  the  Church  of  Becken- 
ham,  Kent." 

Subsequent  editors  have  repeated  his  note, 
but  the  fact  that  the  epitaph  is  on  a  tablet  in 
the  church,  and  that  it  appeared  in  print  before 
Mason's  edition  of  Gray,  has  not  been  recorded 
before.     Clarke  was  a  college  friend  of  Gray's. 

1.  this  silent  marble  weeps.  This  was  a 
common  poetical  phrase  last  century  in  speak- 
ing of  monuments  to  the  dead. 

6.  soft  humanity.  Mitford  cites  lines  from 
Dryden  and  Pope  in  which  this  phrase  occurs. 

7-10.  Mitford  gives  the  six  following  lines 

as  in  a  manuscript  copy  instead  of  lines  7  to  10 

as  finally  decided  on  : — 

"  To  hide  her  cares  her  only  art, 
Her  pleasure,  pleasures  to  impart, 
In  ling- ring  pain,  in  death  resigned, 
Her  latest  agony  of  mind 
Was  felt  for  him,  who  could  not  save 
His  all  from  an  untimely  grave." 

9.  Mrs.  Clarke  died  in  childbirth,  but  the 
infant  survived  her. 


EPITAPH  ON  A  CHILD.  385 


XX.— EPITAPH  ON  A  CHILD. 

This  epitaph  was  written  at  the  request  of 
Dr.  Wharton,  whose  then  only  son  died  in 
infancy  in  April,  1758.  Gray  describes  his  dif- 
ISculty  in  writing  it  in  a  letter  to  Wharton, 
dated  June  18,  1758,  as  follows  : — "  You  flatter 
me  in  thinking  that  anything  I  can  do  could  at 
all  alleviate  the  just  concern  your  late  loss  has 
given  you  ;  but  I  cannot  flatter  myself  so  far, 
and  know  how  little  qualified  I  am  at  present 
to  give  any  satisfaction  to  myself  on  this  head, 
and  in  this  way,  much  less  to  you.  I  by  no 
means  pretend  to  inspiration,  but  yet  I  affirm 
that  the  faculty  in  question  is  by  no  means 
voluntary.  It  is  the  result,  I  suppose,  of  a  cer- 
tain disposition  of  mind,  which  does  not  depend 
on  oneself,  and  which  I  have  not  felt  this  long 
time.  You  that  are  a  witness  how  seldom 
this  spirit  has  moved  me  in  my  life,  may  easily 
give  credit  to  what  I  say. 

It  is  here  printed  from  a  copy  in  the  Mitford 
MSS.,  now  in  the  British  Museum  (32,  561,  Add. 
MSS.).  Mitford  has  entered  it  in  two  places 
in  his  volume  of  MSS. ;  at  p.  74  with  the  note, 
— "  N.  B.  in  Gray's  writing";  and  at  p.  182, 
"  Not  in  Gray's  writing."  The  former  version, 
therefore  I  have  followed. 


386  NOTES. 

It  was  first  printed  by  Mr.  Gosse  (1884) 
"  from  a  copy  in  the  handwriting  of  Alexander 
Dyce,  lately  found  slipped  into  a  book  at  South 
Kensington,  and  made  by  him  when  the  origi- 
nal MS.  was  sold  in  1854." 

Each  of  the  three  copies  differs  slightly  from 
the  others.  In  line  1  there  is  a  comma  after 
"  Here  "  in  the  Dyce  copy  ;  and  it  is  "  free  from 
pain,"  in  Mitford  No.  2,  p.  182.  In  line  8  in 
the  Dyce  copy  it  is  "  Now  "  instead  of  "  Here  " ; 
and  in  Mitford  No.  2  it  is  "  the  Night  of  Death." 
Also  in  the  Mitford  copies  almost  every  substan- 
tive begins  with  a  capital  letter. 


XXL— GRAY  ON  HIMSELF. 

1.  "This  is  similar  to  a  passage  in  one  of 
Swift's  letters  to  Gay,  speaking  of  poets:  'I 
have  been  considering  why  poets  have  such  ill 
success  in  making  their  court.  They  are  too 
libertine  to  haunt  antechambers,  too  poor  to 
hrihe  porters,  and  too  proud  to  cringe  to  second- 
hand favourites  in  a  great  family.'  See  Pope's 
*  Works,'  xi.  36,  ed.    Wharton."— Jfi^(9r<jf. 

importune  must  here  be  pronounced  with  the 
accent  on  the  second  syllable,  for  the  sake  of 
the  rhyme. 

4.  This  means — "  I  am  not  like  some  of  the 


EPITAPH  ON  SIR  W.  WILLIAMS.  387 

wits  of  the  day  who  profess  not  to  believe  in 
God." 

6.  Charles  Townshend  was  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer  in  Chatham's  last  ministry  (1767). 
Horace  Walpole  regarded  him  as  scarcely  in- 
ferior to  Charles  James  Fox  in  wit  and  forensic 
ability ;  and  Macaulay  calls  him  the  most  bril- 
liant and  versatile  of  mankind,  adding  that  he 
"  belonged  to  every  party  and  cared  for  none." 

Squire.  Dr.  Samuel  Squire,  at  that  time 
Fellow  of  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge,  and 
afterwards  Bishop  of  St.  David's.  He  died  in 
1766. 

Some  editors  suppose  that  Goldsmith  took 
these  lines  as  the  model  of  his  character  of 
Burke  in  "  Retaliation  "  ;  but  the  latter  was 
published  in  April,  1774,  and  Gray's  lines  did 
not  appear  till  printed  in  Mason's  edition  in 
1775  (as  a  footnote  to  a  letter  dated  August, 
1758). 


XXII.— EPITAPH  ON  SIK  W.  WILLIAMS. 

Sir  William  Peere  Williams,  Bart.,  was 
killed  at  the  siege  of  Belleisle,  1761.  "  In  the 
recklessness  of  a  desponding  mind,  he  ap- 
proached too  near  to  the  enemy's  sentinels,  and 
was  shot   through   the   body."     Walpole  de- 


388  NOTES. 

scribes  "Williams  as  "  a  gallant  and  ambitious 
yoimg  man,  who  had  devoted  himself  to  war  and 
politics."  He  was  a  captain  in  Burgoyne's 
Dragoons,  raised  in  1759,  now  the  16th  Lan- 
cers ;  see  the  "  Graphic,"  4rth  April,  1891. 

A  letter  of  Gray's  to  Mason,  in  August,  1761, 
gives  the  date  of  the  composition  of  this  epi- 
taph, and  contains  the  following  remarks  of 
Gray  on  it : — "  Mr.  Montagu  (as  I  guess  at 
your  instigation)  has  earnestly  desired  me  to 
write  some  lines  to  be  put  on  a  monument  which 
he  means  to  erect  at  Belleisle.  It  is  a  task  I 
do  not  love,  knowing  Sir  William  Williams  so 
slightly  as  T  did  ;  but  he  is  so  friendly  a  person, 
and  his  affliction  seemed  to  me  so  real,  that  I 
could  not  refuse  him.  I  have  sent  him  the  fol- 
lowing verses,  which  I  neither  like  myself  nor 
will  he,  I  doubt ;  however,  I  have  showed  him 
that  I  wished  to  oblige  him.  Tell  me  your 
real  opinion." 

Writing  to  Brown  on  the  23rd  October,  1780, 
Gray  says  : — "  In  my  way  to  town  I  met  with 
the  first  news  of  the  expedition  from  Sir  Wil- 
liam Williams,  who  makes  a  part  of  it,  and  per- 
haps may  lay  his  fine  Vandyke  head  in  the 
dust." 

In  the  "Gentleman's  Magazine"  for  1761, 
under  date  7th  May,  it  is  stated,  "  An  express 
from  Belleisle  brought  advice  that  Sir  W.  P. 


EPITAPH  ON  SIR  W.  WILLIAMS.  389 

"Williams,  Bart.,  a  captain  of  Burgoyne's  Dra- 
goons, and  M.  P.  for  Shorebam,  had  been  killed 
reconnoitering."  The  date  of  his  death  is  not 
given,  but  it  was  probably  in  the  last  week  of 
April.  See  also  the  "  Annual  Kegister,"  1761, 
p.  17,  and  the  "  Scots'  Magazine,"  1761,  p.  437. 
The  citadel  of  Belleisle  capitulated  on  the  7th 
June  *  ("  Gentleman's  Magazine,"  1761,  p.  282, 
under  date  13  June  *). 

In  a  letter  to  Brown,  dated  26th  May,  1761, 
Gray  writes : — "  Montagu  had  thoughts  of 
going  thither  [Cambridge]  with  me,  but  I  know 
not  what  his  present  intentions  may  be.  He 
is  in  real  affliction  for  the  loss  of  Sir  W.  Wil- 
liams, who  has  left  him  one  of  his  executors, 
and  (as  I  doubt  his  affairs  were  a  good  deal 
embarrassed)  he  possibly  may  be  detained  in 
town  on  that  account." 

The  version  in  the  text  is  that  given  by 
Mason,  and  it  has  been  generally  followed  by 
subsequent  editors.  The  copy  in  the  Mitford 
MSS.  and  in  the  "  Correspondence  of  Gray  and 
Mason,"  p.  268,  differs  from  that  published  by 
Mson  in  three  places :  and  it  seems  probable  that 

*  Mitford,  "  Correspondence  of  Gray  and  Mason  "  by 
mistake  gives  the  13th  June  as  the  date  of  the  capitula- 
tion. Mr.  Gosse  makes  a  furtlier  mistake  in  stating 
that  Williams  was  "  killed  at  the  storming  of  Belleisle, 
June  13." 


22— G  &  G— EE 


390  NOTES. 

Mason,  acting  on  Gray's  request  for  his  "  real 
opinion,"  took  the  liberty,  as  he  did  in  several 
other  instances,  of  altering  the  wording  when 
he  printed  it  among  Gray's  "  Poems  "  in  1775. 
There  is  also  a  copy,  but  not  in  Gray's  hand- 
writing, in  the  Pembroke  MSS.  with  the  fol- 
lowing "  Kejected  stanza  " : — 

"  Warrior,  that  midst  the  melancholy  line 
***** 
Oh  be  his  genius,  be  his  spirit  thine, 
And  share  his  virtues  with  a  happier  fate." 

5.  "  In  the  expedition  to  Aix  he  was  on  board 
the  Magnanme  with  Lord  Howe,  and  was  de- 
puted to  receive  the  capitulation." — Mason. 

5.  Sir  W,  Scott  probably  took  from  this  the 

similar  expression : — 

"  Since,  riding  side  by  side,  our  hand 
First  drew  the  voluntary  brand." 

— Marmion,  C.  iv.  Introduction,  10. 

In  the  Mitford  MSS.  and  Correspondence  " 

it  is 

"  At  Aix  uncalled  his  maiden  sword  he  drew." 

6.  honour,  glory.  Mitford  MSS.  and  "  Cor- 
respondence." 

9.  undaunted,  intrepid.  Mitford  MSS.  and 
"  Correspondence." 

10.  Victor.  Belleisle  had  not  surrendered  at 
the  time  that  "Williams  was  killed,  but  he  calls 
him  "  victor  "  as  belonging  to  the  side  that  was 


THE  DEATH  OF  HOEL.  39I 

ultimately  victorious,  and  also  for  poetical  efifect 
and  as  more  calculated  to  call  forth  sympathy 
that  he  should  have  met  his  death  instead  of  re- 
turning home  with  the  victorious  troops. 

Belleisle  is  a  fortified  island  off  the  coast  of 
France,  in  the  north  of  the  Bay  of  Biscay. 


XXIII.— THE  DEATH  OF  HOEL. 

This  and  the  "  Imitation  from  the  Welsh  " 
were  probably  written  about  the  same  time, 
1764,  as  the  "  Triumphs  of  Owen,"  and  inspired, 
like  it,  by  Evans'  "  Specimens  of  the  Welsh 
Poetry." 

Gray's  heading  to  this  in  the  Pembroke  MSS. 
is  "  From  Aneurin,  Monarch  of  the  Bards,  ex- 
tracted from  the  Gododin." 

The  original  Welsh  is  by  Aneurin,  who 
flourished  about  the  time  of  Taliessin,  a.  d. 
570.  Gray's  version  is  from  the  Latin  transla- 
tion in  Evans'  "  Specimens." 

"  Aneurin  with  the  flowing  Muse,  King  of 
Bards,  brother  to  Giidas  Albanius  the  historian, 
lived  under  Mynyddawg  of  Edinburgh,  a  prince 
of  the  North,  whose  Eurdorchogion,  or  war- 
riors wearing  the  golden  torques,  363  in  number, 
were  all  slain,  except  Aneurin  and  two  others, 
in  a  battle  with  the  Saxons  at  Cattraeth,  on 


392  NOTES. 

the  eastern  coast  of  Yorkshire.  His  '  Godo- 
din,'  a  heroic  poem  written  on  that  event,  is 
perhaps  the  oldest  and  noblest  production  of 
that  age." — Jones,  Relics. 

3.  "  The  kingdom  of  De'ira  included  the 
counties  of  Yorkshire,  Durham,  Lancashire, 
Westmoreland,  and  Cumberland."  — Jones, 
Relics. 

11.  Cattraeth.  Catterick,  in  the  valley  of  the 
Swale,  near  Richmond,  in  Yorkshire. 

12.  Gray  gives  the  number  in  round  numbers 
to  suit  his  verse  ;  in  the  Latin  it  is  "  tricenti 
et  sexaginta  tres,"  363. 

14.  Collars  of  gold  were  badges  of  distinction 
amongst  Keltic  nations. 

16-18.  These  three  lines  are  a  rather  un- 
necessary expansion,  in  so  short  a  piece,  of 
three  words  in  the  Latin, — "  nimio  potu  ma- 
didi,"  which  might  have  been  translated  by 
"  flushed  with  wine,"  as  line  19  also  is  not  in 
the  original. 

23.  And  I.  It  should  be  me,  "  save  me  "  ; 
but /sounds  more  emphatic  here;  the  Latin 
is: — "Non  evasere  nisi  tres,  Acronet Conanus, 
et  egomet  ipse."  Cf.  a  similar  license  in 
*' Paradise  Lost,"  vi.  900:— 

"  Of  those  too  high  aspii'ing,  who  rebelled 
With  Satan,— /te,  who  envies  now  thy  state." 


CARADOC— CONAN.  393 


XXIY.— CAEADOC. 

This  and  the  following  are  Imitations  from 
the  "Welsh,  and  were  first  published  in  the 
Notes  at  the  end  of  Mason's  edition. 

1.  tusky.  In  Webster's  "  Dictionary "  an- 
other instance  in  given  from  Dryden  : — 

"  The  scar  indented  by  the  tusky  boar.'" 

2.  sullen  originally  meant  lonely  (through 
the  French  from  the  Lat.  solus) ;  hence  gloomy ; 
Milton  applies  it  to  a  wintry  day,  and  Gray 
follows  him  in  speaking  of  the  "  sullen  year," 
"  Ode  on  Vicissitude,"  21 ;  "  with  sullen  roar  " 
he  also  takes  from  Milton  : — 

"  I  hear  the  far-off  curfew  sound, 

Over  some  wide-watered  shore, 

Swinging  slow  with  sullen  roar." — H  Penseroso,  76. 


XXV.— CONAK 

1.  rehearse.     Of.  "repeat  their  Chiefs  and 

Loves."     "  Progress  of  Poesy,"  60. 

"  Build  the  lofty  verse.     The  expression  is 

from  "  Lycidas  "  : — 

"  He  knew 
Himself  to  sing,  and  build  the  lofty  rhyme." — 10,  11. 


394  NOTES. 

And  before  Milton  we  have  it  in  Horace  and 

Spenser : —    > 

"  Seucondis  amabile  carmen." — Epistola,  I.  iii.  25. 

"  To  build  with  level  of  my  lofty  style." 

— Ruins  of  Rome,  2. 

8.  shivered,  shattered  by  lightning. 
10.  crimson.     See  the  "  Fatal  Sisters,"  36, 
and  "  Triumphs  of  Owen,"  29. 


XXIV.— THE  CANDIDATE. 

This  squib  was  written  by  Gray  on  the  occa- 
sion of  the  Earl  of  Sandwich  being  a  candidate 
for  the  oifice  of  High  Steward  of  the  University 
of  Cambridge  in  1764.  "  Jemmy  Twitcher " 
was  Lord  Sandwich's  nickname,  and  his  fol- 
lowers were  called  "  Twitcherites."  Lord 
Sandwich  was  a  schoolfellow  of  Gray's  at 
Eton  ;  he  refers  to  him  and  Lord  Halifax  in  a 
letter  to  West,  dated  27  May,  1742,  as  then 
statesmen,  though  not  long  before  "  dirty  boys 
playing  at  cricket."  See  also  letters  of  Feb.  21, 
and  July  10,  1764,  and  29  April,  1765. 

A  printed  copy  of  these  verses,  entitled 
"The  Candidate,  by  Mr.  Gray,"  in  a  quarto 
double  sheet,  is  preserved  in  the  Webb  Collec- 
tion *  in  the  Cambridge  University  Library. 

*  "  A  Collection  of  Papers   [College  notices,  news- 


VERSES  FROM  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE.     395 

In  January,  1782,  they  appeared  in  the 
"  Gentleman's  Magazine."  The  first  edition 
of  Gray's  Poems  in  which  they  appeared,  was 
the  second  edition  of  S.  Jones',  in  1800. 

There  are  a  few  trifling  verbal  differences  in 
the  printed  sheet  in  the  Webb  papers,  and  it 
contains  the  last  couplet  (which  I  have  never 
seen  elsewhere  in  print),  exactly  as  follows : — 

"  D n  ye  both  for  a  couple  of  Puritan  bitches  I 

He's  Christian  enough  that  repents  and  that.  .  .  ." 

9.  Mitf ord    quotes    from    Mason's  "  Heroic 

Epistle  "  : — 

"  That  babe  of  grace 
Who  ne'er  before  at  sermon  showed  his  face 
See  Jemmy  Twitcher  shambles." 


XXVII.— VERSES  FROM  WILLIAM 
SHAKESPEARE. 

These  verses  were  sent  from  Hartlepool  to 
Mason  in  a  letter  dated  July  16,  1765.  They 
were  first  published  in  Mitford's  "  Correspond- 
ence of  Gray  and  Mason,"  1853. 

The  letter  begins  with  the  verses,  and  then 
proceeds  to  say  :  "  Tell  me  if  you  do  not  like 

paper  cuttings,  etc.],  formed  by  tlie  late  Dr.  Webb, 
Master  of  Clare  College,  relating  to  the  University  of 
Cambridge." 


396  NOTES. 

this,  and  I  will  send  you  a  worse.  I  rejoice  to 
hear  your  eyes  are  better,  as  much  as  if  they 
were  my  own."  Mason  acknowledged  it  on 
the  22nd  July,  saying,  "  As  bad  as  your  verses 
were  they  are  yours,  and,  therefore,  when  I 
get  back  to  York,  I  will  paste  them  carefully 
in  the  first  page  of  my  Shakespeare  to  enhance 
its  value.  .  .  .  You  will  not  pity  me  now,  no 
more  than  you  did  when  1  was  in  residence 
and  sore  eyes." 

I  have  followed  the  copy  given  in  Mitford's 
"  Correspondence  of  Gray  and  Mason,"  p.  339  ; 
but  in  the  Mitford  MSS.  there  is  another  copy 
with  several  variations  which  I  shall  note  in 
their  places. 

1.   Mistress  Anne.     Mason's  servant  at  York. 

3.  right  proper  onan,  this  is  an  archaic  ex- 
pression, and  here  simply  means  "  a  real  man  " 
not  a  mere  book  or  a  name),  right  is  an  adverb, 
"  truly,"  —  "  right  fat." — Chaucer,  proper, 
"  well-formed  "  : — "  Thou  art  a  proper  man." — 
Chaucer.  "  Moses  was  hid  three  months  of 
his  parents,  because  they  saw  he  was  a  proper 
child." — Hebrews,  xi.  23. 

5.  cankered.  In  the  Mitford  MSS.  it  is 
"  crabbed." 

6-7.  The  references  are  to  the  editions  of 
Shakespeare  published  by  Rowe,  1709 ;  Pope, 
1721;    Theobald,    1733    (an    attorney);    Sir 


VERSES  FROM  WILLIAM  SHAKESPEARE.    397 

Thomas  Hanmer,  1743  (a  'baronet');  War- 
burton,  1747  (a  '  parson '),  and  Dr.  Johnson, 
1765  (a  'small  poet').  Steevens',  published 
in  1766,  and  Capell's,  1767,  were  probably 
announced  as  in  preparation  when  Gray  wrote 
these  lines. 

8.  worst  of  all.  '  Worse  than  all,'— Mitford 
MSS. 

12.  residence.  Mason  was  Precentor  of  York, 
and  "  Kesidentiary  "  in  the  cathedral;  in  a 
letter  of  Gray's  (October  19, 1763)  he  refers  to 
Mason's  "repining  at  his  four  and  twenty 
weeks'  residence  at  York,  unable  to  visit  his 
bowers,  the  work  of  his  own  hands,  at  Aston." 
marriage.  Mason  at  the  time  Gray  sent  these 
verses,  was  engaged  to  be  married,  and  his 
marriage  took  place  on  the  25th  of  September. 
sore  eyes.  In  the  Mitford  MSS.  it  is  "  mince 
pies  "  ;  but  sore  eyes  is  evidently  the  correct 
reading  as  shown  by  the  extracts  from  the 
letters  quoted  above. 

17-20.  In  the  Mitford  MSS.  this  verse  is  the 
third. 

21.  Clouet  was  a  celebrated  cook  ;  the  mean- 
ing is,  people  in  York  will  taste  cakes  and  pies 
that  even  Clouet  never  heard  of — being  made 
with  the  help  of  Shakespeare,  i.  e.,  of  the  paper 
of  a  copy  of  Shakespeare. 

In  the  British  Museum  there  is  the  copy  oi 


398  NOTES. 

Verral's  "  Cookery  "  which  belonged  to  Gray. 
The  title  is — "  A  Complete  System  of  Cookery, 
in  which  is  set  forth  a  variety  of  genuine  re- 
ceipts collected  from  several  years'  experience 
under  the  celebrated  M.  de  St.  Clouet,  sometime 
since  Cook  to  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Newcastle, 
by  William  Verral,  Master  of  the  White  Hart 
Inn  in  Lewes,  Sussex,  1759."  This  copy  con- 
tains several  receipts  in  Gray's  handwriting  ;  it 
subsequently  belonged  to  Mitford. 

22.  works.  In  the  Mitford  MS.  it  is  "  work  " ; 
and  instead  oi  fumes  the  word  se.ems  to  be 
"  views.^^ 

24.  For  .  .  .  puddings.  The  Mitford  MS. 
has  "  To  .  .  .  cheesecakes." 


XXYIIL— IMPROMPTU. 

These  lines  were  written  at  Denton  in  Kent, 
in  June,  1Y66,  when  Gray  was  on  a  visit  to  the 
Rev.  William  Robinson,  and  were  found  in  the 
drawer  of  Gray's  dressing-table  after  he  was 
gone.  They  were  restored  to  him,  for  he  had 
no  other  copy,  and  had  forgotten  them.  Wal- 
pole  writes  :  "  I  am  very  sorry  that  he  ever 
wrote  them  and  ever  gave  a  copy  of  them. 
You  may  be  sure  I  did  not  recommend  them 
being  printed  in  his  works,  nor  were  they." 


IMPROMPTU.  399 

The  first  four  stanzas  appeared  in  the  sup- 
plement to  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine"  for 
1777,  prefaced  by  the  following  letter  from  the 
correspondent  who  sent  them  : — "  The  im- 
mortal Gray  is  suificiently  known  by  his  elegiac 
poetry.  The  world  has  not  yet  known  to  re- 
vere him  as  a  lover  of  his  country,  and  an  ab- 
horrer  of  its  intestine  foes.  Learn  from  the 
underwritten  stanzas,  suggested  by  a  view,  in 

1766,  of  the  late  lord  H d's  seat  and  ruins 

at  King's-gate,  no  longer  to  consider  Gray  as 
a  mere  man  of  rhyme,  but  as  possessing  a  con- 
stitutional spirit  of  liberty  congenial  to  Church- 
hill's." 

In  February,  1778,  the  two  last  stanzas  were 
supplied,  but  incorrectly,  by  another  cor- 
respondent ;  and  in  January,  1782,  in  a  third 
letter  to  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  "  the 
errors  in  the  previous  one  were  pointed  out, 
the  writer  "  lamenting  that  Mr.  Gray  did  not 
apply  himself  more  to  satire  in  which  undoubt- 
edly he  would  have  excelled."  The  first  edition 
of  Gray's  Poems  in  which  the  verses  appeared 
was  Stephen  Jones'. 

The  house  was  that  built  for  Lord  Holland 
as  a  correct  imitation  of  Cicero's  Formian  villa 
at  Baiae,  under  the  superintendence  of  Sir  T. 
Wynne,  afterwards  Lord  Newborough. 

17.  Lord  Bute  was  Prime  Minister,  1762-63. 


400  NOTES. 

Gray  got  his  name  suggested  to  Bute  in  1762 
for  the  Professorship  of  Modern  History,  but 
was  not  successful. 

18.  In  Upcott's  edition  the  names  given  are 
Mansfield,  Rigby,  Bedford.  In  the  Egerton 
MSS.  they  are  Shelburne,  Rigby,  Calcraft. 
For  all  these  see  the  Index  to  the  "  Letters  of 
Junius."  Rigby  was  Paymaster  of  the  British 
Forces.  Thomas  Bradshaw  was  Secretary  to 
the  Duke  of  Grafton,  and  afterwards  a  Lord  of 
the  Admiralty. 


XXIX.— SATIRE  UPON  THE  HEADS. 

These  lines  were  first  printed  in  Mr.  Gosse's 
edition  of  Gray's  "  Works  "  from  a  MS.  then 
in  the  possession  of  Lord  Houghton. 

I  have  taken  them  from  the  Mitford  MSS. 
in  the  British  Museum. 


XXX.— AMATORY    LINES. 

These  verses  were  first  printed  by  Warton 
in  his  edition  of  Pope's  "  Works,"  1797,  as  a 
footnote  to  Pope's  "  Imitations  of  English 
Poets,"  with  this  note  : — "  In  the  following  love- 
verses  is  a  strain  of  sensibility  which  the  reader 


AMATORY  LINES.  401 

will  be  pleased,  I  suppose,  to  see,  being  now 
first  published  from  a  manuscript  of  Mr.  Gray." 
They  next  appeared  in  a  letter  signed  "  C.  L.  T. 
Etonenis,"  in  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  " 
for  Aug.  1799,  described  as  a  "  literary  curi- 
osity, being  the  only  specimen  of  Gray's  ex- 
cellence in  amatory  composition." 

The  original  MS.  was  presented  by  the 
Countess  de  Yiry  (Miss  Speed)  with  the  ensuing 
"  Song,"  to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Leman  when  he  visited 
her  in  1780,  and  by  him  they  were  given  to 
Warton. 

It  is  probable  that  like  the  "  Song,"  and  the 
"  Rondeau,"  they  were  written  at  the  request 
of  this  Lady,  of  whom  Gray  says  in  the  "  Long 
Story," — "  Alas  who  would  not  wish  to  please 
her." 

The  first  edition  of  Gray's  "  Poems  "  in 
which  these  verses  appeared  was  Stephen  Jones' 
(1799),  who  gave  them  the  title  of  "  The  En- 
quiry," observing,  "  the  following  amatory 
lines  having  been  found  among  the  MSS.  of 
Gray,  but  bearing  no  title,  I  have  ventured 
for  the  sake  of  uniformity  in  this  volume  to 
prefix  the  above  "  ;  and  Mitford  (ed.  1814)  gave 
them  the  title  of  "  Amatory  Lines,"  by  which 
they  have  been  known  ever  since. 


402  NOTES. 

XXXL— SONG.      J 

In  a  brief  memoir  of  Gray  by  Horace  Wal- 
pole,  prefixed  to  Mitford's  "  Correspondence  of 
Gray  and  Mason,"  Walpole  says  : — "  In  Oc- 
tober, 1761,  he  made  words  for  an  old  tune  of 
Geminiani,  at  the  request  of  Miss  Speed.     It 

begins — 

'  Thyrsis,  when  we  parted,  swore.' 

Two  stanzas — the  thought  adapted  from  the 
French." 

In  a  long  note  to  the  "  Long  Story,"  in  the 
edition  of  Gray's  "  Poetical  Works,"  published 
by  Sharpe,  1826,  after  referring  to  the  fact  that 
his  "  gallantry  had  no  deeper  root  than  the 
complaisance  of  friendship,"  the  anonymous 
editor  proceeds  to  say : — "  Another  erroneous 
surmise  of  the  same  nature  [i.  e.,  that  he  was 
in  love  with  Miss  Speed  ]  might  be  formed 
on  hearing  ( what  nevertheless  is  true)  that  the 
beautiful  rondeau,  which  appears  in  the  later 
editions  of  his  works,  was  inspired  by  the  '  wish 
to  please  '  this  lady.  The  fact  is,  however,  that 
it  was  produced  (and  probably  about  this  time) 
on  a  request  she  made  to  the  poet  one  day, 
when  he  was  in  company  with  Mr.  Walpole, 
that  she  might  possess  something  from  his  pen 
on  the  subject  of  love.  ...  It  was  in  the  year 


SONG.  403 

1780  that  Miss  Speed  (then  Countess  de  Yiry) 
enabled  the  lovers  of  poetry  to  see  in  print  the 
'  Eondeau,'  and  another  small  amatory  poem  of 
Gray's  called  '  Thyrsis,'  by  presenting  them  to 
the  Kev.  Mr.  Leman,  of  Suffolk,  while  on  a  visit 
at  her  castle  in  Savoy.     She  died  there  in  1783." 
The  following  references  to  Miss  Speed  in 
Gray's  "  Letters"  are  interesting.     In  June, 
1760,  writing  to  Wharton,  he  saj^s  : — "  I  remain 
.  .  .  still  in  town,  though  for  these  three  weeks 
I     have    been   going    into   Oxfordshire   with 
Madam  Speed.  .  .  .  She  has  got  at  least  £30,000 
with  a  house  in  town,  plate,  jewels,  china  and 
old  japan  infinite  [left  by  Lady  Cobham]."    On 
Oct.  21,  1760  : — "  You  astonish  me  in  wonder- 
ing that  my  Lady  Cobham  left    me  nothing. 
For  my  part,  I  wondered  to  find  that  she  had 
given  me  £20  for  a  ring,  as  much  as  she  gave 
to  several  of  her  nieces.     The  world  said  before 
her  death  that  Miss  Speed  and  I  had  shut  our- 
selves up  with  her  in  order  to  make  her  will, 
and  that    afterwards   we  were  to  he  onarried.''^ 
In  Jan.,  1761 :— "  My  old  friend  Miss  Speed  has 
done  what  the  world  would  call  a  very  foolish 
thing.     She  has  married  the  Baron  de  la  Pey- 
riere,  son  to  the  Sardinian  Minister,  the  Comte 
de  Viry.     The  Castle  of  Viry  is  in  Savoy,  a  few 
miles  from  Geneva,  commanding  a  fine  view  of 
the  Lake." 


404  NOTES. 

It  would  seem  that  there  were  two  or  three 
manuscript  copies  of  this  Song.  It  was  pub- 
lished in  Horace  Walpole's  "  Works,"  in  his  let- 
ters to  the  Countess  of  Ailesbury,  and  that 
copy  was  followed  by  Mitford,  and  is  identical 
with  the  version  in  Mr.  Gosse's  edition  which 
he  incorrectly  describes  as  "  printed  from  a 
copy  by  Stonehewer  at  Pembroke  College." 
In  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine"  for  Oct.  1799, 
it  is  quoted  in  a  letter  in  which  it  is  stated  that 
it  was  first  published  in  Walpole's  "  Works." 

1.  Thyrsis  is  the  name  of  a  shepherd  in  The- 
ocritus and  Virgil,  and  used  in  Milton's 
"  1' Allegro,"  83,  for  a  shepherd  or  rustic,  and 
hence,  in  the  pastoral  and  amatory  poetry  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  it  is  used  to  designate  a  lover. 

In  Stephen  Jones'  edition,  in  which  he  states 
that  this  song  then  appears  for  the  first  time 
among  Gray's  poems,  there  are  the  following 
variations  from  the  usual  text : — 

1.  when  we  parted.  When  he  left  me.  2. 
Ere.     In. 

3.  yon  molet  flower.     The  opening  flower. 

Line  5  comes  after  line  6.  8.     this.     such. 

9.  Western.  Gentle,  skies,  sky.  10.  Speak. 
Prove. 

There  is  also  a  copy  in  the  Mitford  MSS., 
which  had  the  following  variations  in  the  sec- 
ond verse  : — 


EPITAPH  ON  MES.  MASON.  405 

7.  g^'een.     Bloom.     9.   Western.     Warmer. 
10.  Cannot  prove  that  winter's  past. 
12.  Dare  not  to  reproach  my  love. 


XXXIL— EPITAPH  ON  MES.  MASON. 

Mason's  wife  died  in  March,  1767,  and  he 
erected  a  monument  to  her  in  the  Cathedral  at 
Bristol,  with  the  following  inscription : — 

Mary,  the  daughter  of  William  Sherman, 

of  Kingston  upon  Hull,  Esq. 

and  wife  of  the  Rev.  William  Mason, 

Died  March  27,  1767,  aged  28. 

Take,  holy  earth  !  all  that  my  soul  holds  dear  : 

Take  that  best  gift  which  Heaven  so  lately  gave : 
To  Bristol's  fount  I  bore  with  trembling  care 

Her  faded  form  ;  she  bowed  to  taste  the  wave, 
And  died.    Does  Youth,  Does  Beauty,  read  the  line? 

Does  sympathetic  fear  their  breast  alarm  ? 
Speak,  dead  Maria  !  breathe  a  strain  divine  : 

E'en  from  the  grave  thou  shalt  have  power  to  charm. 
Bid  them  be  chaste,  be  innocent  like  thee  ; 

Bid  them  in  Duty's  sphere  as  meekly  move  ; 
And  if  so  fair,  from  vanity  as  free. 

As  firm  in  friendship,  and  as  fond  in  love. 
Tell  them,  though  'tis  an  awful  thing  to  die 

('Twas  e'en  to  thee)  yet  the  dread  path  once  trod, 
Heaven  lifts  its  everlasting  portals  high. 

And  bids  the  pure  in  heart  behold  their  God. 

A  copy  of  it  appeared  in  the  "  Gentleman's 


406  NOTES. 

Magazine  "  for  January,  1794,  and  it  was  always 
assumed  that  the  whole  of  the  epitaph  was 
by  Mason  till  the  "  Reminiscences  of  Norton 
Nichoils  "  were  published  by  Mitford  in  1843,  in 
which  he  states  that  when  Mason  sent  what  he 
had  written  to  Gray,  he  showed  it  to  Nichols,  say- 
ing, "  that  will  never  do  for  an  ending.  I  have 
altered  them  thus,"  and  wrote  in  it  the  last  four 
lines  as  they  now  stand. 

In  a  letter  to  Mason,  not  published  by  him, 
dated  May  23, 1767,  Gray  refers  to  the  epitaph 
and  to  the  line  "  Heaven  lifts,  etc."  being:  his. 


XXXIII.— TOPHET. 

The  person  satirized  in  these  lines  was  the 
Rev.  Henry  Etough,  rector  of  Therfield,  Herts, 
and  Colmnorth,  Bedfordshire.  He  was  a  con- 
verted Jew,  and  the  allusion  in  the  second  line 
is  to  the  fact  that  he  "  kept  the  conscience  "  of 
Sir  R.  Walpole,  who  was  his  patron.  The  epi- 
gram was  first  printed  in  the  "  Gentleman's 
Magazine,"  May,  1785,  where  it  is  stated  that 
he  was  principally  remarkable  for  the  intimate 
knowledge  he  had  obtained  of  the  private  and 
domestic  history  of  all  the  great  families  in  the 
kingdom,  which  made  him,  in  spite  of  outward 
civilities,  an  object  of  secret  dislike. 


TOPHET.  407 

Further  particulars  about  him  may  be  found 
in  the  Cole  MSS.,  in  Coxe's  Life  of  Sir  R. 
"Walpole,  and  in  Nichols'  "Literary  Anecdotes 
of  the  Eighteenth  Century."  In  the  latter  is 
given  the  epitaph  from  his  monument  in  the 
church  at  Therfield,  which  concludes  thus : — 
"  With  a  robust  constitution,  through  a  singular 
habit  of  body,  he  lived  many  years  without  the 
use  of  animal  food,  or  of  any  fermented  liquid  ; 
and  died  suddenly,  Aug.  10,  1757,  in  the  70th 
year  of  his  age." 

Previous  to  Mr.  Gosse's  "  Gray  "  in  "  English 
Men  of  Letters,"  only  six  lines  of  this  epigram 
had  been  printed, — lines  5  and  6  being  omitted. 
In  the  Pembroke  MSS.  the  lines  are  in  Stone- 
hewer's  hand,  with  the  heading  "  Inscription  on 
a  Portrait,"  and  the  first  two  lines  are — 

"  Such  Tophet  was,  so  looked  the  grinning  Fiend, 
Whom  many  a  frighted  Prelate  called  his  friend, 

A  note  indicates  that  lines  3  and  4  are  an 
"  addition  in  the  first  copy." 

Regarding  the  portrait  of  Etough  and  the 
occasion  of  Gray's  writing  these  lines,  Nichols 
writes  : —  "  Mr.  Tyson,  of  Bene't  College,  who, 
amongst  other  various  and  better  attainments 
successfully  cultivated  a  taste  for  drawing, 
made  an  etching  of  him,  a  small  whole  length 
figure,  and    presented   it   to   Mr.   Gray ;  who 


408  NOTES. 

wrote  underneath  it  the  following  epigram." 
(Here  follow  the  lines.) 

An  engraving  from  Tyson's  drawing  was  first 
published  in  Stephen  Jones'  edition,  who  states 
that  he  was  indebted  for  the  sketch  of  the  por- 
trait to  John  Nichols,  Esq.  There  is  a  pen-and- 
ink  sketch  in  the  Cole  MSS. 


XXXIV.— COMIC  LINES. 

These  lines  occur  in  a  letter  from  Gray  to 
Mason,  dated  Pembroke  College,  8th  January, 
1768,  and  are  written  to  tell  him  that  all  "  his 
old  and  new  friends  are  in  constant  expectation 
of  him  at  Cambridge." 

They  were  first  published  in  Mitford's  "  Cor- 
respondence of  Gray  and  Mason,"  and  were  re- 
printed  therefrom  by  Mr.  Gosse.  A  slightly 
different  version  of  them  is  in  the  Mitford  MSS. 
I  have  followed  Mitford's  printed  copy,  except 
that  from  the  MS.  I  have  supplied  in  the 
second  line  the  words  omitted  in  the  "  Corre- 
spondence," and  by  Mr.  Gosse. 

1.  Weddell.  In  the  Mitford  MSS.  it  is  "  Prim 
Hurd."  Mitford's  note  is  :  Mr.  Weddell,  of 
Newby,  who  made  the  collection  of  statues, 
since   belonging  to   Lord  de  Grey,  collected 


COMIC  LINES.  409 

during    his    travels    in    Italy   with  Mr,   Pal- 
grave." 

Palgrave,  one  of  the  Fellows  of  Pembroke, 
familiarly  called  "  Old  Pa."  in  Gray's  letters. 
He  died  1799.     See  "  Gentleman's  Magazine." 

2.  Stoneheiuer,  the  lewd.  These  words  are 
represented  by  dashes  in  Mitford's  "  Corre- 
spondence of  Gray  and  Mason." 

Delaval  the  loud.  Edward  Delaval,  Fellow 
of  Pembroke  and  F.R.  S.  In  a  letter  to  Brown, 
March,  1769,  Gray  writes  "Delaval  is  by  no 
means  well,  and  looks  sadly,  yet  he  goes  about 
and  talks  as  loud  as  everP 

3.  Powell.  William  Samuel  Powell,  elected 
Master  of  St.  John's  College,  17G4.  His  ser- 
mons have  been  highly  praised.  Cole  has  given 
a  long  account  of  him  in  Nichols'  "  Anecdotes," 
1.  564.     Died  in  Jan.  1775. 

Marriot.  Sir  James  Marriot,  Kt.,  Master  of 
Trinity  Hall,  from  1764  to  1803.  There  are 
some  verses  by  him  in  Dodsley's  "  Collection," 
vol.  iv. 

4.  Glymi.  Dr.  Glynn  was  Gray's  physician 
at  Cambridge,  and  a  very  intimate  friend; 
he  was  "  the  loved  lapis  on  the  banks  of 
Cam." 

Tom  Neville.  Thomas  Neville,  Fellow  of 
Jesus  College,  published  Imitations  of  Horace, 
1758,  and  of  Juvenal  and  Persius  in  1769  ;  and 


410  NOTES. 

translated  the  Georgics  of  Yirgil,  1767.    In  the 

"  Horace  "  he  praises 

"  Mason,  who  writes  not  with  low  sons  of  rhyme, 
But  on  Pindaric  pinions  soars  sublime." 

Neville  was  one  of  the  first  persons  to  whom 
Gray  showed  the  "  Bard  "  ;  see  letter  to  Mason, 
June,  1757. 

5.  Brown.  Dr.  James  Brown  (or  Browne) 
was  Fellow,  and  in  1770  Master,  of  Pembroke; 
died  1784.  He  and  Mason  were  Gray's  exec- 
utors. 

8  Dr.  Thomas  Balguy,  of  St.  John's,  refused 
a  bishopric. 


XXXY.— IMPKOMPTUS. 

Pakody  on  an  Epitaph. 

The  epitaph  (which  has  never  before  been 
given  along  with  the  parody)  is  as  follows : 

"  Who  Faith,  Love,  Mercy,  noble  Constancy 
To  God,  to  Virtue,  to  Distress,  to  Right 
Observed,  expressed,  showed,  held  religiously 
Hath  here  this  monument  thou  seest  in  sight. 
The  cover  of  her  earthly  part,  but  passenger 
Know  Heaven  and  Fame  contains  the  best  of  her." 

It  is  on  an  altar  tomb,  with  recumbent  figure 
in  the  chancel  of  Appleby  Church ;  the  monu- 
ment was  erected  in  1617,  to  Margaret  (Rus- 
sell), widow  of  George   Clifford,  3rd  Earl  of 


IMPROMPTUS.  411 

Cumberland,  by  her  only  daughter,  Anne,  suc- 
cessively Countess  of  Dorset  and  of  Pembroke 
and  Montgomery  ;  her  own  tomb,  for  which 
she  also  wrote  the  inscription,  stands  opposite. 
3.  These  were  four  castles  of  the  Barony  of 
Westmoreland,  which  the  Countess  inherited, 
all  of  which  she  rebuilt. 


Couplet  about  Birds. 

This  couplet  was  first  published  in  Mathias, 
edition  of  Gray's  Works  (1814)  vol.  ii.,  p.  596, 
introduced  thus : —  "  One  fine  morning  in  the 
spring  Mr.  Nicholls  was  walking  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Cambridge  with  Mr.  Gray,  who, 
feeling  the  influence  of  the  season,  and  cheered 
with  the  melody  of  the  birds  on  every  bough, 
turned  round  to  his  friend,  and  expressed  him- 
self extempore  in  these  beautiful  lines."  Ma- 
thias, no  doubt,  based  his  remarks  on  Norton 
Nicholls'  "  Reminiscences  of  Gray,"  written  in 
1895,  the  MS.  of  which  was  in  his  possession, 
— ISTichoUs'  reference  to  them  being  : —  "  Two 
verses  made  by  Mr.  Gray  as  we  were  walking 
in  the  spring  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Cam- 
bridge." 

Norton  Nicholls'  "  Reminiscences "  were 
printed  by  Mitford  in  vol.  v.  of  his  "  Works  of 
Gray,"  published  by  Bell  and  Daldy  in  1843. 


412  OTES. 


DOUBTFUL  POEMS. 

I.— ODE. 

This  "  Ode  "  was  first  published  by  Mr.  Gosse. 
"  It  occurs,"  he  says,  "  in  Gray's  handwriting, 
and  among  other  pieces  known  to  be  his  in  the 
Stonehewer  MSS.  Gray  has  written  '  Celadon, 
Dec.  1736,'  at  the  foot  of  it.  At  that  date 
Gray  was  an  undergraduate  at  Peterhouse. 
The  verses  do  not  bear  the  stamp  of  his  mature 
manner,  but  1  know  not  to  whom  they  must 
be  attributed,  if  not  to  Gray." 

I  have  compared  it  with  the  MS.,  and  there 
are  four  errors  in  Mr.  Gosse's  copy. 

Horace  Walpole  says  "  one  of  his  first  pieces 
of  poetry  was  an  answer  in  English  verse  to  an 
epistle  from  H.  W."  This  may  be  it,  but  why 
should  he  sign  it  "  Celadon  "  in  his  Common- 
place Book? 


II.— POETICAL  RONDEAU. 

These  verses  were  first  printed  (in  1783)  in 
Professor  Young's  "  Criticism  on  the  Elegy 
written  in  a  country  Churchyard,  being  a  con- 


POETICAL  RONDEAU.  413 

tinuation  of  Dr.  Johnson's  Criticism  on  the 
Poems  of  Gray  " — in  reality  an  extravagant 
parody  of  Dr.  Johnson's  style  and  criticism, 

111  criticising  the  alliteration  in  "longing 
lingering  look,"  the  writer  says  : — 

"  Of  all  the  elementary  constituents  of  oral 
articulate  sound,  there  is  no  one  which  has  had 
more  attention  paid  to  it  by  the  adepts  in  rep- 
resentative composition,  than  the  semivocal 
incomposite  I.  It  is  easy  of  access,  ready  to 
grant,  or  even  proffer  its  services,  and  ever 
within  call.  To  it,  of  all  the  rest.  Gray  seems 
to  have  paid  peculiar  court.  The  kindness  of 
Dr.  Curzon,  late  of  Brazenose,  now  residing  in 
Italy  for  his  health,  and  to  whom  I  embrace 
this  opportunity  of  recording  my  obligation 
for  materials  that  have  been  of  use  to  me  in 
the  present  work,  has  put  me  in  possession  of 
a  little  relic  of  Gray,  furnishing  a  striking 
illustration  of  his  fondness  for  this  letter,  and 
how  much,  as  the  Doctor  terms  it,  it  had  in- 
sensibly gained  his  ear.  Of  this  relic  I  do  not 
know  that,  in  any  edition  of  Gray's  works,  the 
communication  has  yet  been  indulged  to  the 
public ;  not  even  in  that  one  in  which  the 
author's  literary  correspondence  and  fragments 
of  projected  poems  have  been  printed.  I  am 
contented,  therefore,  to  give  it  to  the  world 
with  part  of  the  letter  to  the  Doctor,  in  which 


22— a   &   G— FF 


414  NOTES. 

it  was  inserted,  as  particularly  connected  with 
the  present  subject,  and  as  illustrative,  more- 
over, of  that  leading  feature  in  the  character 
of  Gray,  the  love  of  project ;  hoping  that  I 
may  do  so  without  offence ;  as  in  offering  this 
gratification  to  rational  literary  curiosity,  for 
which  I  have  the  Doctor's  permission,  I  invade 
no  property,  nor  violate  any  known  right." 

After  some  further  remarks,  there  follows  a 
long  letter  (of  8  pp.)  which  the  writer  would 
have  us  believe  is  by  Gray,  but  which  I  do  not 
think  is  in  Gray's  style,  but  is  rather  of  a  piece 
with  the  burlesque  '•  Criticism "  itself.  The 
"  Rondeau  "  referred  to  in  Sharpe's  edition  of 
Gray's  "  Poetical  Works,"  quoted  in  my  note 
on  the  "  Song  "  (xxxi),  is,  I  think,  the  "  Ama- 
tory Lines  "  (xxx). 

The  copy  printed  by  Mr.  Gosse,  for  the 
original  of  which  he  thanks  Mr.  Frederick 
Locker,  differs  from  that  in  the  "Criticism" 
(2nd  ed.)  (which  I  have  followed)  in  the  fol- 
lowing points : — 

21.         "  They  who  just  have  felt  the  flame." 
31,  32.  "  Then  to  sever  what  is  bound, 
Is  to  tear  the  closing  wound." 
33.  Thus  to  love,  etc. 


THE  CHRIST-CROSS-ROW.  415 


III.— THE      CHAKACTEES      OF     THE 
CHRIST-CROSS-KOW. 

This  fragment  was  first  printed  by  Mitford 
in  1843,  Gray's  "Works,"  vol.  v.  p.  217. 
Horace  "Walpole  says  : — "  Gray  never  would 
allow  the  foregoing  Poem  to  be  bis,  but  it  has 
too  much  merit,  and  the  humour  and  versifica- 
tion are  so  much  in  his  style,  but  I  cannot  be- 
lieve it  to  be  written  by  any  other  hand. — 
(Signed)  H.  W." 

"Dyce  mentions,  in  a  MS.  note  at  South 
Kensington,  that  Gray's  original  autograph  of 
these  lines  has  been  destroyed." 

Walpole  preserved  the  following  fragment 
of  a  letter  from  Gray,  in  which  the  verses  were 
introduced : — 

"  When  I  received  the  testimonial  of  so  many 
considerable  personages  to  adorn  the  second 
page  of  my  next  edition,  and  (adding  them  to 
the  Testimonium  Autoris  de  seipso)  do  relish 
and  enjoy  all  the  conscious  pleasure  resulting 
from  six  pennyworths  of  glory,  I  cannot  but 
close  my  satisfaction  with  a  sigh  for  the  fate 
of  my  fellow-labourer  in  poetry,  the  unfortu- 
nate Mr.  Golding,  cut  off  in  the  flower  or  rather 
the  bud  of  his  honours,  who  had  he  survived  but 


416  NOTES. 

a  fortnight  more,  might  have  been  by  your  kind 
offices  as  much  delighted  with  himself,  as  I. 
Windsor  and  Eton  might  have  gone  down  to 
posterity  together,  perhaps  appeared  in  the 
same  volume,  like  Philips  and  Smith,  and  we 
mio"ht  have  sent  at  once  to  Mr.  Pond  for  the 
frontispiece,  but  these,  alas !  are  vain  reflec- 
tions. To  return  to  myself.  Nay!  but  you 
are  such  a  wit!  sure  the  gentlemen  an't  so 
good,  are  they  ?  and  don't  you  play  upon  the 
word.  I  promise  you,  few  take  to  it  here  at 
all,  which  is  a  good  sign  (for  I  never  knew 
anything  liked  here,  that  ever  proved  to  be  so 
anywhere  else) ;  it  is  said  to  be  mine,  but  I 
strenuously  deny  it,  and  so  do  all  that  are  in 
the  secret,  so  that  nobody  knows  what  to 
think  ;  a  few  only  of  King's  College  gave  me 
the  lie,  but  I  hope  to  demolish  them  ;  for  if  / 
don't  know,  who  should  ?  Tell  Mr.  Chute,  I 
would  not  have  served  him  so,  for  any  brother 
in  Christendom,  and  am  very  angry.  To  make 
my  peace  with  the  noble  youth  you  mention, 
I  send  you  a  Poem  that  I  am  sure  they  will 
read  (as  well  as  they  can)  a  masterpiece — it  is 
said,  being  an  admirable  improvement  on  that 
beautiful  piece  called  Pugna  Porcorum,  which 
begins 

Plangite  porcelli  Porcorum  pigra  propago  ; 


LATIN  POEMS.  417 

but  that  is  in  Latin,  and  not  for  their  reading, 
but  indeed,  this  is  worth  a  thousand  of  it,  and 
unfortunately  it  is  not  perfect,  and  it  is  not 
mine. 

"  When  you  and  Mr.  Chute  can  get  the  re- 
mainder of  '  Marianne,'  *  I  shall  be  much 
obliged  to  you  for  it. — I  am  terribly  impatient." 


LATIN  POEMS. 
XY.— THE  GAURUS. 

The  letter  to  West  in  which  this  was  sent 
begins  thus : — "  What  I  send  you  now,  as  long 
as  it  is,  is  but  a  piece  of  a  poem.  It  has  the  ad- 
vantage of  all  fragments  to  need  neither  intro- 
duction nor  conclusion  ;  besides,  if  you  do  not 
like  it,  it  is  but  imagining  that  which  went  be- 
fore and  came  after,  to  be  infinitely  better. 
Look  in  Sandys'  '  Travels '  for  the  history  of 
Monte  Barbaro  and  Monte  Nuovo." 

The  passage  in  Sandys'  "Travels"  is  as 
follows : — 

"  West  of  Cicero's  Villa  stands  the  eminent 
Gaurus,  a  stony  and  desolate  mountain,  in 
which  there  are  divers  obscure  caverns,  choked 

*  In  July,  1743,  Gray  sent  "  3  Parts  of  Marianne,  a 
novel  by  Marivaux,"  to  Chute. 


41 8  NOTES. 

almost  with  earth,  where  many  have  consumed 
much  fruitless  industry  in  searching  for  treas- 
ure. The  famous  Lucrine  Lake  extended  for- 
merly from  Avernus  to  the  aforesaid  Gaurus, 
but  is  now  no  other  than  a  little  sedgy  plash, 
choked  up  by  the  horrible  and  astonishing 
eruption  of  the  new  mountain  ;  whereof  as  oft 
as  I  think,  I  am  easy  to  credit  whatsoever  is 
wonderful.  For  who  here  knows  not,  or  who 
elsewhere  will  believe,  that  a  mountain  should 
arise  (partly  out  of  a  lake  and  partly  out  of 
the  sea)  in  one  day  and  a  night,  unto  such  a 
height  as  to  contend  in  altitude  with  the  high 
mountains  adjoining  ? 

In  the  year  of  our  Lord  1538,  on  the  29th  of 
September,  when  for  certain  days  foregoing 
the  country  here  about  was  so  vested  with  per- 
petual earthquakes,  as  no  one  house  was  left 
so  entire  as  not  to  expect  an  immediate  ruin ; 
after  that  the  sea  had  retired  two  hundred 
paces  from  the  shore  (leaving  abundance  of 
fish,  and  springs  of  fresh  water  rising  in  the 
bottom)  this  mountain  visibly  ascended,  about 
the  second  hour  of  the  night,  with  an  hideous 
roaring,  horribly  vomiting  stones,  and  such 
store  of  cinders  as  overwhelmed  all  the  build- 
ing thereabout  and  the  salubrious  baths  of 
Tripergula,  for  so  many  ages  celebrated,  con- 
sumed the  vines   to   ashes,  killing  birds  and 


ALCAIC  ODE.  419 

beasts  ;  the  fearful  inhabitants  of  Puzzol  flying 
through  the  dark  with  their  wives  and  children, 
naked,  defiled,  crying  out  and  detesting  their 
calamities.  Manifold  mischiefs  have  they  suf- 
fered by  the  barbarous,  yet  none  like  this  which 
nature  inflicted. 

The  new  mountain,  when  newly  raised,  had 
a  number  of  issues  ;  at  some  of  them  smoking 
and  sometimes  flaming;  at  others  disgorging 
rivulets  of  hot  water  ;  keeping  within  a  terrible 
rumbling ;  and  many  miserably  perished  that 
ventured  to  descend  into  the  hollowness  above. 
But  that  hollow  on  the  top  is  at  present  an 
orchard,  and  the  mountain  throughout  is  bereft 
of  its  terrors." — Bk.  iv.  p.  275. 

There  is  a  translation  of  this  poem  in  the 
"  Gentleman's  Magazine  "  for  July,  1775. 


XYIII.— ALCAIC  ODE. 

In  the  letter  to  West  in  which  Gray  sent  the 
fragment  on  the  "  Gaurus,"  he  says — "  There 
was  a  certain  little  ode  set  out  from  Rome,  in 
a  letter  of  recommendation  to  you,  but  possibly 
fell  into  the  enemies'  hands,  for  I  never  heard 
of  its  arrival.  It  is  a  little  impertinent  to  in- 
quire after  its  welfare,  but  you  that  are  a  father, 
will  excuse  a  parent's  foolish  fondness." 


430         EXPLANATION  OF  THE  PRINTS. 

Stephen  Jones  gives  two  translations  in  verse 
of  this,  one  by  "  a  gentleman  of  Sunderland," 
and  the  other  by  Mr.  Seward, — the  latter  ap- 
peared in  the  "  European  Magazine  "  for  1791. 
It  was  also  translated  by  Walpole  ("  Works  " 
iv.  p.  454),  and  by  Samuel  Kogers. 


EXPLANATION  OF  THE  PRINTS  IN 
BENTLEY'S  "DESIGNS  FOR  SIX 
POEMS  BY  MR.  GRAY,"  1753.* 

Ode  on  the  Spring. 

Frontispiece. — A  Figure  musing,  etc.  The 
ornaments  allude  to  the  chief  subjects  of  the 
poems,  as  the  altar,  chaplet  of  flowers  and 
rustic  pipe,  to  this  ode ;  a  boy  with  a  hobby- 
horse and  a  book,  to  that  on  Eton  ;  a  cat-arion, 
or  cat  with  a  lyre,  sitting  on  a  Dolphin's  back, 
to  that  line  on  the  death  of  a  cat — 

No  Dolphin  came,  no  Nereid  stirred  ; 

a  monkey  with  a  violin  and  a  lawyer's  wig,  to 
my  lord  keeper  Hatton's  dancing  in  the  "  Long 
Story  " ;  a  Roman  sepulchral  altar  inscribed 
Diis  Manibus  Sacrum,  with  a  spade  and  skull, 

*  Now  first  reprinted. 


IN  BENTLEY'S  "  DESIGNS."  421 

to  the  elegy.  The  monkey  painting,  the  lyre, 
the  pen  and  crayon,  are  allusive  to  the  poems 
and  drawings. 

Headpiece. — The  Graces  and  Zephyrs  sport- 
ing. 

Initial  Letter. — Flowers. 

Tailpiece. — A  landscape  with  herds  reposing. 

Od&  on  the  Death  of  a  Favourite  Cat. 

Frontispiece. — The  cat  standing  on  the  brim 
of  the  tub,  and  endeavourmg  to  catch  a  gold- 
fish. Two  cariatides  of  a  river  god  stopping 
his  ears  to  her  cries,  and  Destiny  cutting  the 
nine  threads  of  life,  are  on  each  side.  Above, 
is  a  cat's  head  between  two  expiring  lamps 
and  over  that,  two  mouse-traps,  between  a 
mandarin-cat  sitting  before  a  Chinese  pagoda 
and  angling  for  goldfish  in  a  china  jar ;  and 
another  cat  drawing  up  a  net.  At  the  bottom 
are  mice  enjoying  themselves  on  the  prospect 
of  the  cat's  death ;  a  lyre  and  pallet. 

Headpiece. — The  cat  almost  drowned  in  the 
tub.  A  standish  on  a  table  to  write  her  elegy. 
Two  cats  as  mourners  with  hatbands  and  staves. 
Dead  birds,  mice  and  fish  hung  up  on  each 
side. 

Initial  Letter. — The  cat,  demurest  of  the 
tabby  kind,  dozing  in  an  elbow  chair. 

Tailpiece. — Charon  ferrying  over  the  ghost 


422         EXPLANATION  OF  THE  PRINTS. 

of  the  deceased  cat,  who  sets  up  her  back  on 
seeing  Cerberus  on  the  shore. 

Ode  on  the  Distant  Prospect  of  Eton. 

Frontispiece. — Boys  at  their  sports,  near  the 
chapel  of  Eton,  the  god  of  the  Thames  sitting 
by  ;  the  passions,  misfortunes,  and  diseases  com- 
ing down  upon  them.  On  either  side,  terms 
representing  Jealousy  and  Madness.  Above  is 
a  head  of  Folly ;  beneath  are  playthings  inter- 
mixed with  thorns,  a  sword,  a  serpent,  and  a 
scorpion. 

Headpiece. — Science  adorning  the  shade  of 
Henry  VI.  Two  angels,  bearing  shields  in- 
scribed with  that  King's  name,  support  a  Gothic 
building,  in  allusion  to  his  foundations  at  Eton 
and  Cambridge. 

Initial  Letter. — Part  of  Windsor  Castle. 

Tailpiece. — Two  boys  drestin  watermen's 
cloaths,  rowing  another.  A  view  of  Eton  col- 
lege at  a  distance. 

The  Long  Story. 

Frontispiece. — The  Muses  conveying  the  Poet 
under  their  hoops  to  a  small  closet  in  the  gar- 
den.    Fame  in  the  shape  of  Mr.  P is  flying 

before  ;  and  after  him  the  two  female  warriors, 
as  described  in  the  verses.  On  one  side  is  my 
lord  keeper  Hatton  dancing;  and  among  the 


IN  BENTLEY'S  "  DESIGNS."  423 

ornaments  are  the  heads  of  the  Pope  and 
Queen  Elizabeth  nodding  at  one  another ;  be- 
hind him  is  a  papal  bull,  a  phial  of  sublimate,  a 
dagger  and  a  crucifix  ;  behind  her  the  cannon 
called  Queen  Elizabeth's  pocket-pistol. 

neadpiece. — A  view  of  the  house  which  for- 
merly belonged  to  the  earls  of  Huntington  and 
lord  keeper  Hatton. 

Initial  Letter. — A  coronet,  fan,  muff  and 
tippet,  in  the  manner  of  Hollar. 

Tailpiece. — Ghosts  of  ancient  ladies  and  old 
maids,  peepmg  over  the  gallery. 

Hymn  to  Adversity. 

Frontispiece. — Jupiter  delivering  infant  virtue 
to  Adversity  to  be  educated.  Minerva  and  Her- 
cules on  each  side. 

Headpiece. — Adversity  disturbing  the  orgies 
of  Folly,  Noise  and  Laughter. 

Initial  Letter.— A.  Gorgon's  head,  an  instru- 
ment of  punishment. 

Tailpiece. — Melancholy. 

Elegy  written  iri  a  Country  Churchyard. 

Frontispiece. — A  Gothic  gateway  in  ruins, 
with  the  emblems  of  nobility  on  one  side  ;  on 
the  other,  the  implements  and  employments  of 
the  poor.     Through  the  arch  appears  a  church- 


424   EXPLANATION  OF  BENTLEY'S  "  DESIGNS." 

yard  and  village  church  built  out  of  the  remains 
of  an  abbey.  A  countryman  showing  an  epitaph 
to  a  stranger. 

Headpiece. — Country  labours. 

Initial  Letter. — An  owl  disturbed  and  flying 
from  a  ruinous  tower. 

Tailpiece. — A  country  burial.  At  bottom,  a 
torch  fallen  into  an  ancient  vault. 


APPENDIX. 

I .*— THE  LAST  WILL  AND  TESTAMENT 
OF  THOMAS  GRAY. 

Extracted  from  the  Registry  of  the  Prerogative  Court 
of  Canterbury. 

In  the  name  of  God.  A7yien.  I  Thomas 
Gray,  of  Pembroke-Hall  in  the  University  of 
Cambridge,  being  of  sound  mind  and  in  good 
health  of  body,  yet  ignorant  how  long  these 
blessings  may  be  indulged  me,  do  make  this 
my  last  Will  and  Testament  in  manner  and 
form  following.  First,  I  do  desire  that  my 
body  may  be  deposited  in  the  vault,  made  by 
my  late  dear  mother  in  the  churchyard  of 
Stoke-Pogeis,  near  Slough  in  Buckinghamshire, 
by  her  remains,  in  a  coffin  of  seasoned  oak, 
neither  lined  nor  covered,  and  (unless  it  be 
very  inconvenient)  I  could  wish  that  one  of  ray 
executors  may  see  me  laid  in  the  grave,  and 
distribute  among  such  honest  and  industrious 
poor  persons  in  the  said  parish  as  he  thinks  fit, 

*  The  first  eight  of  the  following  extracts  appeared  ui 
the  Aldine  edition,  edited  by  Mitford.  They  have  been 
compared  with  the  originals  and  corrected. 

425 


426  APPENDIX. 

the  sum  of  ten  pounds  in  charity. — Next,  I 
give  to  George  Williamson,  esq.  my  second 
cousin  by  the  father's  side,  now  of  Calcutta  in 
Bengal,  the  sum  of  five  hundred  pounds  re- 
duced Bank  annuities,  now  standing  in  my 
name.  I  give  to  Anna  Lady  Goring,  also  my 
second  cousin  by  the  father's  side,  of  the  county 
of  Sussex,  five  hundred  pounds  reduced  Bank 
annuities,  and  a  pair  of  large  blue  and  white 
old  Japan  china  jars.  Item^  I  give  to  Mary 
Antrobus  of  Cambridge,  spinster,  my  second 
cousin  by  the  mother's  side,  all  that  my  free- 
hold estate  and  house  in  the  parish  of  St. 
Michael,  Cornhill,  London,  now  let  at  the  yearly 
rent  of  sixty-five  pounds,  and  in  the  occupation 
of  Mr.  Nortgeth,  perfumer,  provided  that  she 
pay  out  of  the  said  rent,  by  half-yearly  pay- 
ments, Mrs.  Jane  Olliffe,  my  aunt,  of  Cam- 
bridge, widow,  the  sum  of  twenty  pounds  fer 
annum  during  her  natural  life ;  and  after  the 
decease  of  the  said  Jane  Olliffe  I  give  the  said 
estate  to  the  said  Mary  Antrobus,  to  have  and 
to  hold  to  her  heirs  and  assigns  for  ever. 
Further,  I  bequeath  to  the  said  Mary  Antro- 
bus the  sum  of  six  hundred  pounds  new  South- 
sea  annuities,  now  standing  in  the  joint  names 
of  Jane  Olliffe  and  Thomas  Gray,  but  charged 
with  the  payment  of  five  pounds  j9er  annum  to 
Graves  Stokeley  of  Stoke-Pogeis,  in  the  county 


GRAY'S  LAST  WILL.  427 

of  Bucks,  Tvhich  sum  of  six  hundred  pounds, 
after  the  decease  of  the  said  annuitant,  does  (by 
the  will  of  Anna  Rogers  my  late  aunt)  belong 
solely  and  entirely  to  me,  together  ^vith  all 
overplus  of  interest  in  the  mean-time  accruing. 
Further,  if  at  the  time  of  my  decease  there 
shall  be  any  arrear  of  salary  due  to  me  from 
his  Majesty's  Treasury,  I  give  all  such  arrears 
to  the  said  Mary  Antrobus.  Item.,  I  give  to 
Mrs.  Dorothy  Comyns  of  Cambridge,  my  other 
second  cousin  by  the  mother's  side,  the  sum  of 
six  hundred  pounds  old  South-sea  annuities,  of 
three  hundred  pounds  iovci:  per  cent.  Bank  an- 
nuities consolidated,  and  of  two  hundred  pounds 
three  ^er  cent.  Bank  annuities  consolidated,  all 
now  standing  in  my  name.  I  give  to  Richard 
Stonehewer,  esq.,  one  of  his  Majesty's  Com- 
missioners of  Excise,  the  sum  of  five  hundred 
pounds  reduced  Bank  annuities,  and  I  beg  his 
acceptance  of  one  of  ray  diamond  rings.  I 
give  to  Dr.  Thomas  Wharton,  of  Old  Park  in 
the  Bishoprick  of  Durham,  five  hundred  pounds 
reduced  Bank  annuities,  and  desire  him  also  to 
accept  one  of  m}'-  diamond  rings.  I  give  to  my 
servant,  Stephen  Hempstead,  the  sum  of  fifty 
pounds  reduced  Bank  annuities,  and  if  he  con- 
tinues in  my  service  to  the  time  of  my  death  I 
also  give  him  all  my  wearing  apparel  and  linen. 
I  give  to  my  two  cousins  above  mentioned,  Mary 


428  APPENDIX. 

Antrobus  and  Dorothy  Comyns,  all  my  plate, 
watches,  rings,  china-ware,  bed  linen  and  table- 
linen,  and  the  furniture  of  my  chambers,  at  Cam- 
bridge, not  otherwise  bequeathed,  to  be  equally 
and  amicably  shared  between  them.  I  give  to 
the  Reverend  William  Mason,  precentor  of  York, 
all  my  books,  manuscripts,  coins,  music  printed 
or  written,  and  papers  of  all  kinds,  to  preserve 
or  destroy  at  his  own  discretion.  And  after 
my  just  debts  and  the  expenses  of  ray  funeral  are 
discharged,  all  the  residue  of  my  personal  estate, 
whatsoever,  I  do  hereby  give  and  bequeath  to 
the  said  Reverend  William  Mason,  and  to  the 
Reverend  Mr.  James  Browne,  President  of  Pern- 
broke-Hall,  Cambridge,  to  be  equally  divided 
between  them,  desiring  them  to  apply  the  sum 
of  two  hundred  pounds  to  an  use  of  charity 
concerning  which  I  have  already  informed  them. 
And  I  do  hereby  constitute  and  appoint  them, 
the  said  William  Mason  and  James  Browne, 
to  be  joint  executors  of  this  my  last  Will  and 
Testament.  And  if  any  relation  of  mine,  or 
other  legatee,  shall  go  about  to  molest  or  com- 
mence any  suit  against  my  said  executors  in  the 
■execution  of  their  office,  I  do,  as  far  as  the  law 
will  permit  me,  hereby  revoke  and  make  void 
all  such  bequests  or  legacies  as  I  had  given  to 
that  person  or  persons,  and  give  it  to  be  divided 
between  my  said  executors  and  residuary  legar 


GRAY'S  LAST  WILL.  429 

tees,  whose  integrity  and  kindness  I  have  so 
long  experienced,  and  who  can  best  judge  of 
my  true  intention  and  meaning.  In  witness 
whereof  I  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and  seal 
this  2d  day  of  July,  1770. 

Tho.  Gray. 

Signed,  sealed,  ind)lished,  and  declared  hy  the 
said  Thomas  Gray,  the  testator,  as  and  for  his 
Last  Will  and  Testament,  in  the  presence  of 
us,  who  in  his  presence  and  at  his  request, 
and  in  the  presence  of  each  other,  have  signed 
our  names  as  witnesses  hereto. 

Richard  Baker, 
Thomas  Wilson. 
Joseph  Turner. 

Proved  at  London  the  12th  of  August,  1771, 
before  the  Worshipful  Andrew  Coltre  Ducarel, 
Doctor  of  Laws  and  Surrogate,  by  the  oaths  of 
the  Reverend  William  Mason,  Clerk,  Master  of 
Arts,  and  the  Reverend  James  Browne,*  Clerk, 
Master  of  Arts,  the  executors,  to  whom  ad- 

*  Mr.  Gray  used  to  go  with  his  friend  Browne  to  a 
reading-room  in  the  evening.  Browne,  who  was  a 
very  punctual  man,  just  before  the  hour  of  going,  used 
to  get  up,  walk  about  the  room,  and  make  a  bustle  with 
his  gown,  etc.  "  Now,"  says  Gray,  "  Browne  is  going 
to  strike."— Mitford. 


430  APPENDIX. 

ministration    was   granted,    having   been  first 
sworn  duly  to  administer. 

John  Stevens, 
Henry  Stevens, 
George  Gostlij^ig,  jun. 


Deputy 
Registers, 


IL— "CASE"  SUBMITTED  TO  COUNSEL 
BY  MRS.  PHILIP  GRAY. 

The  following  curious  paper  I  owe  to  the 
kindness  of  Sir  Egerton  Brydges  and  his  friend 
Mr.  Haslewood.  It  was  discovered  in  a  volume 
of  manuscript  law  cases,  purchased  by  the 
latter  gentleman  at  the  sale  of  the  late  Isaac 
Reed's  books.  It  is  a  case  submitted  by  the 
mother  of  Gray  to  the  opinion  of  an  eminent 
civilian  in  1735  ;  and  it  proves,  that  to  the 
great  and  single  exertions  of  this  admirable 
woman.  Gray  was  indebted  for  his  education, 
and  consequently  for  the  happiness  of  his  life. 
The  sorrow  and  the  mournful  affection  with 
which  he  dwelt  on  his  mother's  memory,  serves 
to  show  the  deep  sense  he  retained  of  what  she 
suffered,  as  well  as  what  she  did  for  him.  Those 
who  have  read  the  memoirs  of  Kirke  White  in 
Mr.  Southey's  Narrative,  will  recognize  the 
similarity  of  the  situation  in  which  the  two 


MRS.  GRAY'S  CASE.  43I 

poets  were  placed,  in  their  entrance  into  life  ; 
and  they  will  see,  that  if  maternal  love  and 
courage  had  not  stept  in,  in  both  cases,  their 
genius  and  talents  would  have  been  lost  in  the 
ignorance,  or  stifled  by  the  selfishness,  of  those 
about  them. — Mitford. 

CASE. 

"  Philip  Gray,  before  his  marriage  with  his 
wife,  (then  Dorothy  Antrobus,  and  who  was 
then  partner  with  her  sister  Mary  Antrobus,) 
entered  into  articles  of  agreement  with  the 
said  Dorothy,  and  Mary,  and  their  brother 
Robert  Antrobus,  that  the  said  Dorothy's  stock 
in  trade  (which  was  then  240^.)  should  be  em- 
ployed by  the  said  Mary  in  the  said  trade,  and 
that  the  same,  and  all  profits  arising  thereby, 
should  be  for  the  sole  benefit  of  the  said 
Dorothy,  notwithstanding  her  intended  cov- 
erture, and  her  sole  receipts  alone  a  sufficient 
discharge  to  the  said  Mary  and  her  brother 
Robert  Antrobus,  who  was  made  trustee.  But 
in  case  either  the  said  Philip  or  Dorothy  dies, 
then  the  same  to  be  assigned  to  the  survivor. 

"  That  in  pursuance  of  the  said  articles,  the 
said  Mary,  with  the  assistance  of  the  said 
Dorothy  her  sister,  hath  carried  on  the  said 
trade  for  near  thirty   years,   with    tolerable 


432  APPENDIX. 

success  for  the  said  Dorothy.  That  she  hath 
been  no  charge  to  the  said  Philip  ;  and  during 
all  the  said  time,  hath  not  only  found  herself 
in  all  manner  of  apparel,  but  also  for  all  her 
children,  to  the  number  of  twelve,  and  most 
of  the  furniture  of  his  house  ;  and  paying  40^. 
a  year  for  his  shop,  almost  jpromding  every 
thing  for  her  son,  whilst  at  Eton  school,  and 
now  he  is  at  Peter-House  at  Garnhridge. 

"  Notwithstanding  which,  almost  ever  since 
he  hath  been  married,  he  hath  used  her  in  the 
most  inhuman  manner,  by  beating,  kicking? 
punching,  and  with  the  most  vile  and  abusive 
language;  that  she  hath  been  in  the  utmost 
fear  and  danger  of  her  life,  and  hath  been 
obliged  this  last  year  to  quit  her  bed,  and  lie 
with  her  sister.  This  she  was  resolved,  if  pos- 
sible, to  hear  ;  not  to  leave  her  shop  of  trade  for 
the  sake  of  her  son,  to  he  able  to  assist  in  the 
maintenance  of  him  at  the  University,  since  his 
father  wonH. 

"  There  is  no  cause  for  this  usage,  unless  it 
be  an  unhappy  jealousy  of  all  mankind  in 
general  (her  own  brother  not  excepted);  but  no 
woman  deserves,  or  hath  maintained,  a  more 
virtuous  character  :  or  it  is  presumed  if  he  can 
make  her  sister  leave  off  trade,  he  thinks  he 
can  then  come  into  his  wife's  money,  but  the 
s,rticles  are  too  secure  for  his  vile  purposes. 


MRS.  GRAY'S  CASE.  433 

"  He  daily  threatens  he  will  pursue  her  with 
all  the  vengeance  possible,  and  will  7'uin  him- 
self to  undo  her,  and  his  only  son  ;  in  order  to 
which  he  hath  given  warning  to  her  sister  to 
quit  his  shop,  where  they  have  carried  on  their 
trade  so  successfully,  which  will  be  almost 
their  ruin  :  but  he  insists  she  shall  go  at  Mid- 
summer next ;  and  the  said  Dorothy,  his  wife, 
in  necessity  must  be  forced  to  go  along  with 
her,  to  some  other  house  and  shop,  to  be  as- 
sisting to  her  said  sister,  in  the  said  trade,  for 
her  own  and  son's  siqyj^ort. 

"  But  if  she  can  be  quiet,  she  neither  expects 
or  desires  any  help  from  him :  but  he  is  really 
so  very  vile  in  his  nature,  she  hath  all  the 
reason  to  expect  most  troublesome  usage  from 
him  that  can  be  thought  of. 

QUESTION. 

"  What  he  can,  or  possibly  may  do  to 
molest  his  wife  in  living  with  her  sister,  and  as- 
sisting in  her  trade,  for  the  purposes  in  the 
said  articles  ;  and  which  will  be  the  best  way 
for  her  to  conduct  herself  in  this  unhappy  cir. 
cumstance,  if  he  should  any  way  be  trouble- 
some, or  endeavour  to  force  her  to  live  with 
him  ?  And  whether  the  said  Dorothy  in  the 
lifetime  of  the  said  Philip,  may  not  by  will, 
or  otherwise,  dispose  of  the  interest,  or  produce, 
28 


434  APPENDIX. 

which  hath,  or  may  arise,  or  become  due  for 
the  said  stock  as  she  shall  think  fit,  it  being 
apprehended  as  part  of  her  separate  estate  ? " 

ANSWER. 

"  If  Mrs.  Gray  should  leave  her  husband's 
house,  and  go  to  live  with  her  sister  in  any 
other,  to  assist  her  in  her  trade,  her  husband 
may,  and  probably  will  call  her,  by  process  in 
the  Ecclesiastical  Court,  to  return  home  and 
cohabit  with  him,  which  the  court  will  compel 
her  to  do,  unless  she  can  show  cause  to  the 
contrary.  She  has  no  other  defence  in  that 
case,  than  to  make  proof,  before  the  court,  of 
such  cruelties  as  may  induce  the  judge  to  think 
she  cannot  live  in  safety  with  her  husband : 
then  the  court  will  decree  for  a  separation. 

"  This  is  a  most  unhappy  case,  and  such  a 
one,  as  I  think,  if  possible,  should  be  referred 
to,  and  made  up  by  some  common  friend ; 
sentences  of  separation,  by  reason  of  cruelty 
only,  being  very  rarely  obtained. 

"  What  the  cruelties  are  which  he  has  used 
towards  her,  and  what  proof  she  is  able  to 
make  of  them,  I  am  yet  a  stranger  to.  She 
will,  as  she  has  hitherto  done,  bear  what  she 
reasonably  can,  without  giving  him  any  prov- 
ocation to  use  her  ill.  If,  nevertheless,  he 
forces  her  out  of  doors,  the  most  reputable 


EXTRACTS  FROM  THE  COLE  MSS.    435 

place  she  can  be  in,  is  with  her  sister.  If  he 
will  proceed  to  extremities,  and  go  to  law,  she 
will  be  justified,  if  she  stands  upon  her  de- 
fence, rather  perhaps  than  if  she  was  plaintiff 
in  the  cause. 

"  As  no  power  of  making  a  will  is  reserved 
to  Mrs.  Gray  by  her  marriage  settlement,  and 
not  only  the  original  stock,  but  likewise  the 
produce  and  interest  which  shall  accrue,  and 
be  added  to  it,  are  settled  upon  the  husband, 
if  he  survives  his  wife ;  it  is  my  opinion  she 
has  no  power  to  dispose  of  it  by  will,  or  other- 
wise. 

"  JOH.  AUDLEY." 

"  Doctors'  Commons. 
Feb.  9th,  1735." 


III.— EXTRACTS   FROM   THE    MSS.   OF 
THE  REV.  WILLIAM  COLE, 

(Rector  of  Bumham  in  BuckingMm,  and  of  Milton  in 
Camhridgeshire. ) 

On  Tuesday,  July  30th,  17Y1,  Mr.  Essex 
calling  on  me,  in  his  way  to  Ely,  told  me  that 
Mr.  Gray  was  thought  to  be  dying  of  the  gout 
in  his  stomach.  I  had  not  heard  before  that 
he  was  ill,  though  he  had  been  so  for  some 
days.     So  I  sent  my  servant  in  the  evening  to 


436  APPENDIX. 

Pembroke-Hall,  to  enquire  after  his  welfare ; 
but  he  was  then  going  off,  and  no  message 
could  be  delivered ;  and  he  died  that  night. 
He  desired  to  be  buried  early  in  the  morning 
at  Stoke-Pogeis  ;  *  and  accordingly  was  put  in 
lead,  and  conveyed  from  Cambridge  on  Sunday 
morning,  with  a  design  to  rest  at  Hodsdon  the 
first  night,  and  Salt-hill  on  Monday  night, 
from  whence  he  might  be  very  early  on  Tues- 
day morning  at  Stoke.  He  made  the  master 
of  Pembroke  (his  particular  friend)  his  execu- 
tor ;  who,  with  his  niece  f  Antrobus,  Mr. 
Cummins  a  merchant  of  Cambridge,  who  had 
married  her  sister,  and  a  young  gentleman  of 
Christ's-College  with  whom  he  was  very  in- 
timate, went  in  a  mourning-coach  after  the 
hearse,  to  see  him  put  into  his  grave. 

He  left  all  his  books  and  MSS.  to  his  partic- 
ular friend  Mr.  Mason,  with  a  desire  that  he 
would  do  with  the  latter  what  he  thought 
proper.  When  he  saw  all  was  over  with  him, 
he  sent  an  express  to  his  friend  Mr.  Stonehewer, 
who  immediately  came  to  see  him  ;  and  as  Dr. 
Gisborne  happened  to  be  with  him  when  the 

*  At  strawberry-Hill  there  was  a  drawing  by  Bacon 
of  Gray's  tomb,  by  moonlight  ;  given  to  Lord  Orford, 
by  Sir  Edward  Walpole.  See  Lord  Orford's  "  Works," 
vol.  ii.  p.  425. — Mitford. 

f  An  oversight  for  "  second  cousin."— J.  B, 


EXTRACTS  FROM  THE  COLE  MSS.         437 

messenger  came,  he  brought  him  down  to 
Cambridge  with  him ;  which  was  the  more 
lucky,  as  Professor  Plumptre  *  had  refused 
to  get  up,  being  sent  to  in  the  night.  Put  it 
was  too  late  to  do  any  good  :  and  indeed  he 
had  all  the  assistance  of  the  faculty  f  besides 
at  Cambridge.  It  is  said,  that  he  has  left  all 
his  fortune  to  his  two  nieces  :J:  at  Cambridge  ; 
and  just  before  his  death,  about  a  month,  or 
thereabout,  he  had  done  a  very  generous  action, 
for  which  he  was  much  commended. 

His  aunt  Olliffe,  an  old  gentlewoman  of 
Norfolk,  had  left  that  county,  two  or  three 
years,  to  come  and  live  at  Cambridge ;  and 
dying  about  the  time  I  speak  of,  left  him  and 
Mr.  Cummins  executors  and  residuary  legatees ; 
but  Mr.  Gray  generously  gave  up  his  part  to 
his  nieces :{:  one  of  whom  Mrs.  Olliffe  had  taken 
no  notice  of,  and  who  wanted  it  sufficiently. 
....  I  was  told  by  Alderman  Burleigh,  the 
present  mayor  of  Cambridge,  that  Mr.  Gray's 
father  had  been  an  Exchange-broker,  but  the 


*  Dr.  Plumptre  certainly  refused  to  get  up  to  attend 
Gray  in  his  last  illness ;  but  it  was  to  be  considered, 
that  he  was  grown  old,  and  had  found  it  necessary  to 
adopt  this  rule  with  all  his  patients. — Mitford. 

f  Dr.  Glynn  was  Gray's  physician  at  Cambridge,  and 
likewise  a  very  intimate  friend. — lb. 

X  Second  cousins. 


22— O  ft  O— GO 


438  APPENDIX. 

fortune  he  had  acquired  of  about  £10,000  was 
greatly  hurt  by  the  fire  in  Cornhill ;  so  that 
Mr.  Gray,  many  years  ago,  sunk  a  good  part 
of  what  was  left  and  purchased  an  annuity,  in 
order  to  have  a  fuller  income.  I  have  often 
seen  at  his  chambers,  in  his  ink-stand,  a  neat 
pyramidal  bloodstone  seal,  with  these  arms  at 
the  base,  viz.^  a  lion  rampant,  within  a  border 
engrailed,  being  those  of  the  name  of  Gray, 
and  belonged,  as  he  told  me,  to  his  father. 
His  mother  was  in  the  millinery  way  of 
business. 

His  person  was  small,  well  put  together,  and 
latterly  tending  to  plumpness.  He  was  all  his 
life  remarkably  sober  and  temperate,  but  his 
manner  from  a  boy  was  disgustingly  effeminate, 
finical  and  affected.  I  think,  1  heard  him  say 
he  never  was  across  a  horse's  back  in  his  life. 
He  gave  me  a  small  print  or  etching  of  himself 
by  Mr.  Mason,  which  is  extremely  like  him. 

W  7P  7P  TP  w  W 

I  am  apt  to  think  the  characters  of  Yoiture 
and  Mr.  Gray  were  very  similar.  They  were 
both  little  men,  very  nice  and  exact  in  their 

*  Sir  Egerton  Brydges  informs  me,  that  Gray's  arms 
are  the  same  as  those  of  Lord  Gray  of  Scotland ;  who 
claimed  a  relationship  with  him,  (see  Mason's  "  Me- 
moirs," vol.  iv,  letter  55),  and  as  the  present  Earl 
Grey's.— 3Iitford. 


EXTRACTS  FROM  THE  COLE  MSS.         439 

persons  and  dress,  most  lively  and  agreeable  in 
conversation,  except  that  Mr.  Gray  was  apt  to 
be  too  satirical,  and  both  of  them  full  of  affec- 
tation. 

In  Gil  Bias,  the  print  of  Scipio  in  the  arbour, 
beginning  to  tell  his  own  adventures  to  Gil 
Bias,  Antonio,  and  Beatrix,  was  so  like  the 
countenance  of  Mr.  Gray,  that  if  he  sat  for  it, 
it  could  not  be  more  so.  It  is  in  a  12mo  edi- 
tion in  four  volumes,  printed  at  Amsterdam, 
chez  Herman  Yytwerf,  1735,  in  the  4th  volume, 
p.  94 — p.m.  It  is  ten  times  more  like  him  than 
his  print  before  Mason's  life  of  him,  which  is 
horrible,  and  makes  him  a  fury.  That  little 
one  done  by  Mr.  Mason  is  like  him  ;  and  placid 
Mr.  Tyson  spoilt  the  other  by  altering  it. 

It  must  have  been  about  the  year  ITTO, — the 
first  time  that  Dr.  Farmer  and  Mr,  Gray  ever 
met  to  be  acquainted  together,  as  about  that 
time  I  met  them  at  Mr.  Oldham's  chambers,  in 
Peter-House,  to  dinner.  Before,  they  had  been 
shy  of  each  other ;  and  though  Dr.  Farmer 
was  then  esteemed  one  of  the  most  ingenious 
men  in  the  University,  yet  Mr.  Gray's  singular 
nicenessin  the  choice  of  his  acquaintance  made 
him  appear  fastidious  to  a  great  degree,  to  all 
who  were  not  acquainted  with  his  manner. 


440  APPENDIX. 

Indeed,  there  did  not  seem  to  be  any  probabil- 
ity of  any  great  intimacy  from  the  style  and 
manner  of  each  of  them.  The  one  a  cheerful, 
companionable,  hearty,  open,  downright  man, 
of  no  great  regard  to  dress  or  common  forms 
of  behaviour ;  the  other,  of  a  most  fastidious 
and  recluse  distance  of  carriage,  rather  averse 
to  sociability,  but  of  the  graver  turn  ;  nice, 
and  elegant  in  his  person,  dress,  and  behaviour, 
even  to  a  degree  of  finicalness  and  effeminacy. 
So  that  nothing  but  their  extensive  learning 
and  abilities  could  ever  have  coalesced  two 
such  different  men,  and  both  of  great  value  in 
their  own  line  and  walk.  They  were  ever 
after  great  friends ;  and  Dr.  Farmer,  and  all 
of  his  acquaintance,  had  soon  after  too  much 
reason  to  lament  his  loss,  and  the  shortness  of 
their  acquaintance. 

IY._TWO  LATIN  EPITAPHS 

In  the  Church  of  Burnham,  in  Buckingham- 
shire, supposed  by  Cole  to  have  been  composed 
by  Gray.* 

Huic  Loco  prope  adsunt  Cineres 

ROBERTI  ANTROBUS. 

Vir  fuit,  si  quis  unquam  fuit,  Amicorum  amans, 

Et  Amicis  amandus. 

*  I  doubt  if  the  epitaph  on  Antrobus  was  by  Gray,  as 
he  was  then  but  fifteen. — J.  B. 


EXTRACTS  FROM  THE  COLE  MSS.    441 

Ita  Ingenio  et  Doctrina  valuit, 

Ut  suis  Honori  fuerit,  et  aliis  Commodo 

Si  Mores  respicis,  probus  et  humanus. 

Si  Animum,  semper  sibi  constans. 

Si  Fortunam,  plura  meruit  quam  tulit. 

In  Memoriam  defuncti  posuit 

Hoc  Marmor 


M.  S. 


Jonathani  Rogers, 

Qui  Juris  in  Negotia  diu  versatus, 

Opibus  modicis  laudabili  Industria  partis. 

Extremes  Vitee  Annos 

Sibi,  Amicis,  Deo  dicavit, 

Humanitati  ejus  nihil  Otium  detraxit, 

Nihil  Integritati  Negotia. 

Quaenam  bonse  Spei  justior  Causa, 

Quam  perpetua  Moruni  Innocentia 

Animus  erga  Deum  reverenter  affectus, 

Erga  omnes  Homines  benevole  ? 

Vixit  Ann.  Ixv.  Ob.  Stoke  in  Com.  Bucks. 

A.  D.  MDCCXLH.  Octob.  xxi.* 

Anna,  Conjux  moestissima, 

per  Annos  xxxiii. 

Nulla  unquam  intercedente 

Querimonia 

Omnium  Curarum  Particeps, 

Hoc  Marmor 

(Sub  quo  et  suos  Cineres  juxta  condi  destinat) 

Pietatis  OfBcium  heu  I  ultimum, 

P.  C. 

*  Hitherto  incorrectly  given  as  xxxi. — J.  B, 


442  APPENDIX. 


y.— FEOM  SIR  EGERTON  BRYDGES  TO 
REV.  J.  MITFORD. 

Among  the  friends  of  Gray,  was  the  Rev. 
"William  Robinson,  (third  brother  of  Mrs. 
Montagu,)  of  Denton  Court,  near  Canterbury, 
and  rector  of  Burfield,  Berks.  He  was  edu- 
cated at  Westminster,  and  at  St.  John's  College, 
Cambridge,  where  he  formed  a  particular  inti- 
macy with  Gray,  Avho  twice  visited  him  at 
Denton.*  He  died-December,  1803,  aged  about 
seventy-five. 

Mr.  Robinson  was  an  admirable  classical 
scholar,  to  whose  taste  Gray  paid  great  defer- 
ence. He  did  not  consider  Mason  as  equal  to 
the  task  of  writing  Gray's  Life  ;  and  on  that 
account  when  Mason  (from  his  knowledge  of 
Mr.  R.'s  intimacy  with  Gray)  communicated 
his  intention  to  him,  Mr.  Robinson  declined 
returning  him  an  answer,  which  produced  a 
coolness  between  them  which  was  never  after- 
wards made  up.  Mr.  Robinson,  however, 
owned  that  Mason  had  executed  his  task  better 
than  he  had  expected. 

The  "  Lines  on  Lord  Holland's   House  at 

*  See  Gray's  beautiful  description  of  Kentish  scenery, 
in  a  letter  to  Dr.  Wharton,  dated  August  26,  1766. 


FROM  SIR  EGERTON  BRYDGES.  443 

Kings-gate,"  were  written  when  on  a  visit  to 
Mr.  Robinson,  and  found  in  the  drawer  of 
Gray's  dressing-table  after  he  was  gone.  They 
were  restored  to  him ;  for  he  had  no  other 
copy,  and  had  forgotten  them. 

What  was  the  real  ground  of  the  quarrel  be- 
tween Gray  and  Walpole  Avhen  abroad,  I  do 
not  know ;  but  have  reason  to  believe  that  it 
was  of  too  deep  a  nature  ever  to  be  eradicated 
from  Gray's  bosom ;  which  I  gather  from  cer- 
tain expressions  half  dropped  to  Mr.  Robinson. 
Mr.  R.  thought  Gray  not  only  a  great  poet,  but 
an  exemplary,  amiable,  and  virtuous  man. 
Gray's  poems  on  "  Lord  Holland "  first  ap- 
peared in  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine  "  (1777), 
vol.  xlvii.  p.  624,  and  vol.  xlviii.  p.  88 ;  that 
on  "  Jemmy  Twitcher,"  in  vol.  liii.  (January, 

1782). 

When  he  went  to  court  to  kiss  the  king's 
hand  *  for  his  place,  he  felt  a  mixture  of  shy- 
ness and  pride,  which  he  expressed  to  one  of 
his  intimate  friends  in  terms  of  strong  ill- 
humour. 

*  "  What  if  for  nothing  once  you  kist 

Against  the  grain,  a  monarch's  fist."— SwiFTo 


444  APPENDIX. 


VI.— FKOM  CKADOCK'S  "MEMOIES." 

The  pleasantest  morning  that  I  passed  at 
Cambridge,  was  in  company  with  Mr.  Gray, 
and  some  critics,  at  the  rehearsal  of  the  music 
for  his  Ode,  previous  to  its  grand  performance 
at  the  Senate  House ;  and  I  thought  that  as  he 
had  so  many  directions  to  give,  and  such  nice 
distinctions  to  make,  it  was  well  he  had  to 
deal  with  the  pliant  Dr.  Kandall,  rather  than 
with  some  of  the  very  able  composers  in  the 
metropolis.  Mr.  Gray  was  not  much  more 
comfortable  than  the  Chancellor  himself;  for 
the  press  was  teeming  with  abuse,  and  a  very 
satirical  parody  was  then  preparing,  which  soon 
afterwards  appeared.  His  own  delicious  Ode 
must  always  be  admired,  yet  this  envenomed 
shaft  was  so  pointedly  levelled  at  him,  though 
he  affected  in  his  letter  *  to  Mason  to  disregard 
it,  that  with  his  fine  feelings  he  was  not  only 
annoyed,  but  very  seriously  hurt  by  it. — Yol  i. 
p.  lOY-8. 

From  time  to  time  I  had  treasured  up  many 
bon-mots  of  Gray  communicated  by  Mr.  Tyson, 
and  by  the  former  fellow-collegian  of  Gray, 

*  It  should  be  "letter  to  Beattie,"  viz.,  that  of 
July  16. 


BRAY'S  NOTES.  445 

the  Rev.  Mr.  Sparrow,  of  "Walthamstow,  who 
was  always  attentive  to  his  witty  effusions. 

Some  few  of  these  have  been  printed  incor- 
rectly, and  freely  bestowed  on  others  in  the 
Johnsoniana.  Johnson  was  highly  displeased 
that  any  should  be  attributed  to  him,  as  men- 
tioned by  Mr.  Davies.  "When  he  was  publish- 
ing his  "  Lives  of  the  Poets,"  I  gave  him  sev- 
eral anecdotes  of  Gray,  but  he  was  only  anxious 
as  soon  as  possible  to  get  to  the  end  of  his 
labours.  Not  long  since  I  received  a  very  kind 
message  from  the  Kev.  Mr.  Bright,  Skeffington 
Hall,  Leicestershire,  to  inform  me  that  he  had 
wished  to  deposit  with  me  all  the  remaining 
papers  and  documents  of  Gray,  as  bequeathed 
to  him  by  Mr.  Stonehewer,  but  that  he  found 
they  all  had  been  carried  to  Rome  inadver- 
tently by  a  learned  Editor.  If  recovered  they 
should  certainly  be  consigned  to  me. — Ih. 
p.  183-4. 


YIL— EXTRACTS  FROM  MR.  BRAY'S 

NOTES. 

See  Mrs.  Bray's  Description  of  Devonshire,  in  letters  to 
R.  Southey,  Esq.,  vol.  iii.  p.  311. 

Jan.  27,  1807.  In  a  conversation  which  I 
had  with  Mr.  Mathias  on  Italian  literature,  he 
informed  me  that  Gray,   though   so   great  a 


446  APPENDIX. 

poet  himself,  and  an  admirer  of  the  poets  of 
Italy,  was  unacquainted  with  the  works  of 
Guidi,  Menzini,  Filicaia,  etc.,  and  indeed  of 
almost  all,  that  are  contained  in  his  "  Compo- 
Dimenti  Lirici."  He  had  once  in  his  possession 
the  commonplace  book  of  Gray,  and  it  con- 
tained very  copious  extracts  from  the  Com- 
mentary of  Crescembini.  He  told  me  that  he 
could  gratify  me  with  a  sight  of  Gray's  hand- 
writing, and  fetched  from  his  library  a  fac- 
simile, being  a  kind  of  commentary  in  English 
on  Pindar  and  Aristophanes.  It  was  written 
remarkably  neat  and  plain,  but  rather  stiff,  and 
bearing  evident  marks  of  being  written  slowly. 
It  had  a  great  resemblance  to  the  Italian  mode 
of  writing,  every  part  of  the  letters  being 
nearly  of  an  equal  thickness.  He  wrote  always 
with  a  crow-quill. 

Observing  no  obliterations  or  erasures,  and 
indeed  only  one  or  two  interlineations ;  I  re- 
marked that  it  must  have  been  a  fair  copy,  and 
wondered  how  he  could  have  taken  so  much 
pains,  unless  he  had  intended  it  for  publication. 
But  Mr.  Mathias  assured  me,  that  Gray  was  so 
averse  to  publication,  that  had  not  a  surrep- 
titious copy  of  his  "  Elegy  in  a  Country  Church- 
yard" appeared,  he  never  would  have  pub- 
lished it ;  and  even  when  he  did,  it  was  with- 
out his  name.     The  reason  that  he  was  so  cor- 


BRAY'S  NOTES.  447 

rect,  was  that  he  never  committed  any  thing  to 
paper  till  he  had  most  maturely  considered  it 
beforehand, 

Mr.  Mathias  explained  to  me  how  he  was  so 
well  acquainted  with  these  particulars  respect- 
ing Gray,  by  informing  me  that  he  was  most 
intimate  with  Mr.  Nichols,  the  familiar  friend 
and  executor  of  Gray,  who  had  lent  him  the 
MSS.     On  my  lamenting  that  they  were  never 
made  public,  he  said  that  it  was  not  for  want 
of  his  most  earnest  solicitation,  but  that  Mr. 
Nichols  was  an  old  man,  and  wished  ever  to 
conceal  that  he  was  in  possession  of  any  such 
precious  reliques,  lest  he   should   be  plagued 
with  requests  to  have  them  copied,  or  at  least 
to  show  them.     He  therefore  in  a  manner  en 
joined  me  to  secrecy,  and  I  consequently  com- 
mit the  pleasant  memoranda  to  paper,  merely 
for  my  own  satisfaction,  that,   on   occasional 
inspection,  the  pleasure  I  received  from  this 
conversation  may  be  more  firmly  brought  to 
my  recollection.     For  the  same  reason,  and  as 
these  MSS.  are  never  likely  to  be  made  public, 
I  shall  enter  more  at  largo  upon  the  considera- 
tion of  them ;  at  least  as  much  as  a  cursory 
inspection  during  a  morning  call  would  permit. 
As  Gray  always  affixed  the  date  to  every- 
thing he  wrote,  which  as  Mr.  Mathias  assured 
me,  was  the  custom  of  Petrarch,  it  seems  that 


448  APPENDIX. 

he  wrote  his  remark  on  Pindar  at  rather  an 
early  age.  I  think  the  date  was  1747.  It  is 
very  closely  written :  the  Greek  characters  are 
remarkably  neat.  He  begins  with  the  date  of 
the  composition,  and  takes  into  his  considera- 
tion almost  everything  connected  with  it,  both 
chronologically  and  historically.  The  notes  of 
the  Scholiasts  do  not  escape  him,  and  he  is  so 
minute  as  to  direct  his  attention  to  almost 
every  expression.  He  appears  to  have  recon- 
ciled many  apparent  incongruities,  and  to  have 
elucidated  many  difficulties.  I  the  more  lament 
these  valuable  annotations  remain  unpublished, 
as  they  would  prove  that  in  the  opinion  of  so 
great  a  man,  the  English  language  is  in  every 
respect  adequate  to  express  everything  that 
criticism  the  most  erudite  can  require.  It  pre- 
sented to  my  eye  a  most  gratifying  novelty,  to 
see  the  union  of  Greek  and  English,  and  to 
find  that  they  harmonized  together  as  well  as 
Greek  and  Latin. 

The  remarks  on  the  plays  of  Aristophanes 
were  so  minute,  not  only  expressing  where  they 
were  written  and  acted,  but  when  they  were 
revived  ;  that  as  Mr.  Mathias  justly  observed, 
"  one  would  think  he  was  reading  the  account 
of  some  modern  comedy,  instead  of  the  dramatic 
composition  of  about  two  thousand  years  old." 
Gray  also  left  behind  him  very  copious  re- 


BRAY'S  NOTES.  449 

marks  upon  Plato,  which  had  also  formerly 
been  in  Mr.  Mathias's  hands,  likewise  large  col- 
lections respecting  the  customs  of  the  ancients, 
etc.  And  so  multifarious  and  minute  were  his 
investigations,  that  he  directed  his  attention 
even  to  the  Supellex,  or  household  furniture  of 
the  ancients,  collecting  together  all  the  passages 
of  the  classics  that  had  any  reference  to  the 
subject. 

Mr.  Mathias  showed  me  likewise  many 
sheets  copied  by  Gray  from  some  Italian  au- 
thor ;  also,  I  believe,  an  historical  composition, 
and  a  great  many  genealogies,  of  which  Gray 
was  particularly  fond.  On  my  remarking  that 
I  wished  Gray  had  written  less  genealogies 
and  more  poetry,  he  informed  me  that  the 
reason  he  had  written  so  little  poetry,  was 
from  the  great  exertion  it  cost  him,  (while  he 
made  no  reserve  in  composing)  in  the  labour  of 
composition.  Mr.  Mathias  informed  me  that 
he  had  seen  the  original  copy  of  Gray's  "  Ode 
on  the  Progress  of  Poesj,"  that  there  were  not 
so  many  alterations  as  he  expected ;  which 
was  evidently  owing  to  his  method  of  long 
previous  meditation,  and  that  some  of  the  lines 
were  written  three  or  four  times  over ;  and 
then,  what  is  not  always  the  case  with  an 
author,  the  best  is  always  adopted. 

He  said  there  was  nothing  of  which  Gray 


450  APPENDIX. 

had  not  the  profoundest  knowledge,  at  least  of 
such  subjects  as  come  under  the  denonoiination 
of  learning,  except  mathematics,  of  which,  as 
well  as  his  friend  Mason,  he  was  as  completely 
ignorant,  and  which  he  used  frequently  to 
lament.  He  was  acquainted  with  botany,  but 
hardly  seems  to  have  paid  it  the  compliment  it 
deserves,  when  he  said  he  learnt  it  merely  for 
the  sake  of  sparing  himself  the  trouble  of 
thinking. 


VIIL— SIR    JAMES    MACKINTOSH    ON 
GRAY'S  POETICAL  CHARACTER. 

"Gray  was  a  poet  of  a  far  higher  order 
(than  Goldsmith),  and  of  an  almost  opposite 
kind  of  merit.  Of  all  English  poets  he  was 
the  most  finished  artist.  He  attained  the 
highest  degree  of  splendour  of  which  poetical 
style  seems  to  be  capable.  If  Virgil  and  his 
scholar  Racine  may  be  allowed  to  have  united 
somewhat  more  ease  with  their  elegance,  no 
other  poet  approaches  Gray  in  this  kind  of  ex- 
cellence. The  degree  of  poetical  invention 
diffused  over  such  a  style,  the  balance  of  taste 
and  of  fancy  necessary  to  produce  it,  and  the 
art  with  which  the  offensive  boldness  of  imagery 
is  polished  away,  are  not  indeed  always  per- 


SIR  JAMES  MACKINTOSH  ON  GRAY      45I 

ceptible  to  the  common  reader,  nor  do  they 
convey  to  any  mind  the  same  species  of  grati- 
fication, which  is  felt  from  the  perusal  of  those 
poems,  which  seem  to  be  the  unpremeditated 
effusions  of  enthusiasm.  But  to  the  eye  of  the 
critic,  and  more  especially  to  the  artist,  they 
afford  a  new  kind  of  pleasure,  not  incompatible 
with  a  distinct  perception  of  the  art  employed, 
and  somewhat  similar  to  the  grand  emotions 
excited  by  the  reflection  on  the  skill  and  toil 
exerted  in  the  construction  of  a  magnificent 
palace.  They  can  only  be  classed  among  the 
secondary  pleasures  of  poetry,  but  they  never 
can  exist  without  a  great  degree  of  its  higher 
excellencies. 

Almost  all  his  poetry  was  lyrical — that  spe- 
cies which,  issuing  from  a  mind  in  the  highest 
state  of  excitement,  requires  an  intensity  of 
feeling  which,  for  a  long  composition,  the 
genius  of  no  poet  could  support.  Those  who 
complained  of  its  brevity  and  rapidity,  only 
confessed  their  own  inability  to  follow  the 
movements  of  poetical   inspiration.*     Of    the 

*  In  another  place,  the  same  writer  observes  : — "  The 
obscurity  of  the  Ode  on  the  '  Progress  of  Poesy,'  arises 
from  the  variety  of  the  subjects,  the  rapidity  of  the 
transitions,  the  boldness  of  the  imagery,  and  the 
splendour  of  the  language  ;  to  those  who  are  capable  of 
that  intense  attention,  which  the  higher  order  of  poetry 
requires,  and  which  poetical  sensibility  always   pro- 


452  APPENDIX. 

two  grand  attributes  of  the  Ode,  Dryden  had 
displayed  the  enthusiasm,  Gray  exhibited  the 
magnificence. 

He  is  also  the  only  modern  English  writer 
whose  Latin  verses  deserve  general  notice,  but 
we  must  lament  that  such  difficult  trifles  had 
diverted  its  genius  from  its  natural  objects. 
In  his  Letters  he  has  shown  the  descriptive 
powers  of  a  poet,  and  in  new  combinations  of 
generally  familiar  words,  which  he  seems  to 
have  caught  from  Madame  de  Sevigne  (though 
it  must  be  said  he  was  somewhat  quaint)  he 
was  eminently  happy.  It  may  be  added,  that 
he  deserves  the  comparatively  trifling  praise 
of  having  been  the  most  learned  poet  *  since 
Milton."  t 

duces,  there  is  no  obscurity.  In  the  '  Bard '  some  of 
these  causes  of  obscurity  are  lessened  ;  it  is  more  im- 
passioned and  less  magnificent,  but  it  has  more  brevity 
and  abruptness.  It  is  a  lyric  drama,  and  this  structure 
is  a  new  source  of  obscurity." 

*  Gray  and  Mason  first  detested  the  imposition  of 
Chatterton.  See  "  Archaeological  Epistle  to  Dean 
Milles,"  Stanza  xi.  It  appears  that  Gray  did  not  admire 
Hudibras.  "  Mr.  Gray,"  says  Warburton,  "  has  cer- 
tainly a  true  taste.  I  should  have  read  Hudibras  with 
as  much  indifference  as  perhaps  he  did,  were  it  not  for 
a  fondness  of  the  transactions  of  those  times,  against 
which  it  is  a  satire." — "Warburton's  "  Letters,"  xxxi.  p. 


t  See  "  Life  of  Sir  J.  Mackintosh,"  vol.  ii.  p.  172. 


ADVERTISEMENT  OF  GRAY'S  POEMS.    453 


IX.  —  ADVEETISEMENT  TO  FOULIS' 
GLASGOW  EDITION  OF  GKAY'S 
POEMS,  1768. 

Some  gentlemen  may  be  surprised  to  see  an 
edition  of  Mr.  Gray's  Poems  printed  at  Glas- 
gow, at  the  same  time  that  they  are  printed 
for  Mr.  Dodslev  at  London.  For  their  satis- 
faction  the  printers  mention  what  follows. 

The  property  belongs  to  the  author,  and  this 
edition  is  by  his  permission.  As  an  expression 
of  their  high  esteem  and  gratitude,  they  have 
endeavoured  to  print  it  in  the  best  manner. 

Mr.  Beattie,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the 
University  of  Aberdeen,  first  proposed  this  un- 
dertaking. AVhen  he  found  that  it  was  most 
agreeable  to  the  printers,  he  procured  Mr. 
Gray's  consent,  and  transcribed  the  whole 
with  accuracy.  His  transcription,  is  followed 
in  this  edition. 

This  is  the  first  work  in  the  Roman  character 
which  they  have  printed  with  so  large  a  type ; 

290.  He  appears  highly  to  have  praised  some  of  W. 
Whitehead's  poems.  See  Mason's  "  Life  of  Whitehead," 
p.  40,  etc.,  and  he  approved  H.  Walpole's  "  Tragedy  of 
the  Mysterious  Mother."  See  "  Letter  to  G.  Montagu," 
p.  iOQ.—3IUford. 


454  APPENDIX. 

and  the  J  are  obliged  to  Dr.  Wilson  for  prepar- 
ing so  expeditiously,  and  with  so  much  atten- 
tion, characters  of  so  beautiful  a  form. 


X.— EXTRACT  FROM  ADVERTISEMENT 
IN  JOHN  MURRAY'S  EDITION  OF 
GRAY'S  POEMS,  1778. 

After  stating  that  Mr.  Mason  had  filed  a 
bill  in  chancery  against  the  publisher  for  having 
trespassed  on  his  property  by  inserting  fifty 
lines  in  a  former  edition  which  belonged  to 
him,  and  had  retained  Thurlow,  "Wedderburn, 
and  Denning  as  his  counsel,  the  publisher  adds : 
— "  Fifty  lines  cannot  be  an  object  for  a  man 
to  throw  £100  or  more  money  after ;  it  leads 
an  impartial  person  to  suspect  that  Mr,  Mason 
has  a  further  object  in  view,  and  that  although 
he  has  realised  already  nearly  £1,000  from  the 
profits  of  his  quarto  edition  of  Mr.  Gray's 
Poems,  he  is  not  satisfied,  but  desires  to  sup- 
press the  publisher's  little  volume  altogether, 
although  it  has  not  hitherto  paid  the  expenses 
incurred  in  printing  it,  in  order  to  retain  the 
monopoly  of  Mr.  Gray's  Poems  entirely  in  his 
own  hands." 


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